Ponderbox

[dr-baker]

And absolutely no one talks about Senna forcing Lotus to break their JPS contract, or winning the 1988 title despite having less points than Prost, or his rather.......icky choice in "younger" women. You just have to kowtow to the myth and move on.

The latter of those is something I never knew until this year. The official F1 ThemTube channel published a "15 greatest moments of Senna brilliance" video, and half the comments said "herp derp you chose that number deliberately, didn't you?"

I didn't know this until reading this thread. Where did this knowledge come from? Why was this not forthcoming any sooner?

[Wallio]

I didn't know this until reading this thread. Where did this knowledge come from? Why was this not forthcoming any sooner?

The general internet thought process has been "well he was only 25 so ten years age difference is fine." I also don't know what the age of consent in Brazil was then, so its possible that it was only 15 (it was infamously only 14 in Texas for a long time) and Aryton didn't exactly hide the relationship. It seems like it was sort of an open secret in F1 circles at the time.

[mario]

I was thinking about this over the Monaco weekend, in this sense: why is it, that in all my years watching F1 (34 of them now), there has never been a similar tribute for, say, Jim Clark? I've checked, and every year ending in an eight from 1978-2018 has had a German Grand Prix at Hockenheim. I had to check, because some years it was at the Neu-Euro-Disney Nürburgring, some years it didn't happen at all, but every time there was a multiple-of-ten-years anniversary of Clark's near-unbelievable fatal accident, I can barely remember a word about it. And, in the 1960s, he was considered the absolute best of the best, alongside Fangio who lived into his 80s.

I can only assume it's because Senna is the first and only World Champion to have died on track in the era of TV. We all saw it live, at least, those of us who were alive and watching in 1994. None of us saw Jochen Rindt's fatal accident in a World Championship Grand Prix. None of us saw Denny Hulme die at Bathurst when he was in his 50s. Certainly none of us saw Alberto Ascari die in a testing accident, and likely as not, everyone who did is also now dead. About as close as we got before Senna was Niki Lauda not dying at the Proper Nürburgring in 1976 and carrying on to two more titles with his face burnt off.

Am I right?

Your point is a big part of it but there is also the strange, dare I say cult-like deification of Senna. I can remember during the Schumacher years, some of his most vocal critics were die hard Senna fans, and heaven forbid you compare the two in terms of sportsmanship. This went on while he was alive too. The title of the official 1993 season review is literally "Senna takes 5 wins en route to 2nd in the championship". Wait.....what? Everyone is so quick to point out how Senna was "screwed" at Monaco '84, but Bellof was catching him at seconds per lap. When Prost complained about Senna getting special engines in 1989, Honda was upset that he went to the press.....but they never denied it (Ron did, but not Honda themselves).

And absolutely no one talks about Senna forcing Lotus to break their JPS contract, or winning the 1988 title despite having less points than Prost, or his rather.......icky choice in "younger" women. You just have to kowtow to the myth and move on.

I would agree with the point that at least part of it comes from the fact that Senna's peak in success coincided with a time that the sport was having a significant impact in the media in many parts of the world.

Added to that, I think part of it is that there had also been a shift in mentality in that era due to the fact that a number of high profile drivers had high speed accidents in the late 1980s and early 1990s, but escaped with relatively minor injuries, such as Gerhard Berger's accident in the 1989 San Marino GP. There were those who seemed to think in the late 1980s and early 1990s that, given the drivers had gotten away with such accidents, that there would never be another fatal accident in Formula 1, and with there having been a relatively long period of time since the last fatal accident, Senna's accident was therefore shocking to a generation that had thought such tragedies were a distant memory.

To some extent, whilst a fatal accident might be shocking, there were those in the past that did not encourage much mourning of a driver killed in a fatal accident - i.e. encouraging drivers to think that it was an acceptable risk to take. Even now, many decades on, you still occasionally find people who vehemently hate Stewart and complain that "he made the sport too safe" - and there were plenty who hated him at the time (Jenkinson's repeated bile against Stewart is well known). By the time of Senna's death, that attitude seems to have become less prevalent.

It also has to be said that many of those who were amongst the generation that witnessed Senna's fatal accident, or first began watching the sport not long after that crash, still make up a significant proportion of the current fan base. There is an immediacy to the memory that earlier drivers do not have, given so few would have had first hand experience (especially in an era when media coverage was so limited).

The other aspect, as Wallio touches on, is that there has been much more of a deification of Senna. Part of that may be the fact that the foundation he set up, which is still active, has also had a notable impact in keeping his memory alive - I don't think any other driver left a charitable institution that has been as active and had as much of an impact on the driver's home community as his did and helped keep his name relevant to those from a subsequent generation.

Part of it, also, is perhaps because of the tendency to romanticise and idealise the past as being a purer golden age, especially amongst those who seem to be particularly hostile to what is termed the "Americanisation" of Formula 1 under Liberty Media. There is perhaps the slightly darker aspect in how Senna's reputation has been burnished as a means of denigrating the current era - when some idealise the 1980s and 1990s as "proper racing" enacted by "proper men", Senna's memory has perhaps been hijacked by those wanting to present that era as a counter to the current image of the sport and a means of demanding a return to a past that they want to believe existed.

And absolutely no one talks about Senna forcing Lotus to break their JPS contract, or winning the 1988 title despite having less points than Prost, or his rather.......icky choice in "younger" women. You just have to kowtow to the myth and move on.

The latter of those is something I never knew until this year. The official F1 ThemTube channel published a "15 greatest moments of Senna brilliance" video, and half the comments said "herp derp you chose that number deliberately, didn't you?"

I didn't know this until reading this thread. Where did this knowledge come from? Why was this not forthcoming any sooner?

I think it would have been from the memoirs of Adriane Yamin, with whom Senna would have been having that relationship at the time.

The explanation that I have seen given for why relationship between Senna, who was 25 at the time, and Adriane Yamin, who was 15, was considered more acceptable seems to be due to Brazil having a lower age of consent than in other nations (14), and because Adriane's mother is referred to as having also chaperoned her daughter much of the time. It is therefore suggested that people would not have commented that much about it because that sort of relationship would have been within acceptable cultural norms in Brazilian society.

[dr-baker]

Thank you to Mario and Wallio for answering my question respectfully.

[Har1MAS1415]

https://racingnews365.com/ocon-does-not ... th-f1-team

If this is true, how long will it take for Ocon to burn his bridges with Haas?

[dr-baker]

Is Monza one of the only ovals where its road course is outfield rather than infield?

[mario]

Is Monza one of the only ovals where its road course is outfield rather than infield?

I guess it depends on how you define what counts as an outfield road course - you could make a technical argument that Sakhir, for example, might count as an example, as it does officially have an oval layout (although I don't think it has actually been used for racing).

You'd probably be on safer ground with Calder Park and Adelaide International Raceway in Australia, and Twin Ring Motegi in Japan is probably another circuit in the mould of what you are looking for.

[dr-baker]

Is Monza one of the only ovals where its road course is outfield rather than infield?

I guess it depends on how you define what counts as an outfield road course - you could make a technical argument that Sakhir, for example, might count as an example, as it does officially have an oval layout (although I don't think it has actually been used for racing).

You'd probably be on safer ground with Calder Park and Adelaide International Raceway in Australia, and Twin Ring Motegi in Japan is probably another circuit in the mould of what you are looking for.

Motegi did kinda cross my mind after writing that post. And I suppose Mexico City would count as well?

[dr-baker]

Alonso and Hamilton together in an Adrian Newey designed Aston Martin in 2027, 20 years after they were previously teammates - thoughts? I think the limiting factor in that scenario is how competitive each driver would still be, but I would love to see them try!

[mario]

Alonso and Hamilton together in an Adrian Newey designed Aston Martin in 2027, 20 years after they were previously teammates - thoughts? I think the limiting factor in that scenario is how competitive each driver would still be, but I would love to see them try!

I suspect that neither driver would be particularly keen on reliving that experience again, even if it would be 20 years down the line.

I agree that, by that point in time, their age would be a significant factor. Alonso turns 46 in 2027, and you'd have to go back to John Love in 1972 to find the last time a driver of 46 or older last raced in F1 - and much as he is hyped up, the fact that Lance Stroll is rated so lowly by many does also raise the question of whether Alonso really does have a competitive benchmark to be measured against and whether he is maximising the performance of the car.

As for Hamilton, asides from the fact he'd be 42, you also would have to wonder if he'd still have the drive to compete by then, given some do feel as if his decision to drive for Ferrari might be marking something of a swansong.

[CoopsII]

A timely ponder; what went so wrong for Daniel Ricciardo in F1? 8 wins in ten years doesn't really tell the full story about how much potential the lad had.

[Row Man Gross-Gene]

A timely ponder; what went so wrong for Daniel Ricciardo in F1? 8 wins in ten years doesn't really tell the full story about how much potential the lad had.

Yeah, it's worth talking about for sure. I don't know yet whether he's been dropped at this moment, but it seems likely soon and definitely before next season.

I'm not sure what happened, but there are some possibilities. One that is pure speculation is that perhaps he's suffering from the effects of long Covid. If he got the disease before being vaccinated, long covid could be an explanation. There are still people struggling with it. Now I don't believe he's ever gone public with anything like that, so it's unlikely, but the timing to his downturn is almost perfect. Still, I don't think so.

Second, perhaps he was just well suited to the 2009 aero regulations which ran from 2009-2016 (and straddled two different engine formulae). His point totals peaked in 2016... That said, he still seemed to be quick in 17 and 18, so probably not.

There are other combinations of the car argument with various revisions to the car regs including the big one in 2022. Switching teams might have masked which changes might have been the real problems for him. I'm not sure there is a great argument either way. I still thought he'd turn it around after his second year at McLaren, but he hasn't really.

So, maybe he just aged, stopped caring quite so much, and combined with the ground-effect car (which was yet another reset), he just lost that last edge he needs to be great. I'd still take him over a number of the other drivers, just based on his ability to get the car home in its performance window.

But it is a disappointing finish considering that in 2014-2016 he was tapped as a future World Champion™.

[mario]

A timely ponder; what went so wrong for Daniel Ricciardo in F1? 8 wins in ten years doesn't really tell the full story about how much potential the lad had.

Yeah, it's worth talking about for sure. I don't know yet whether he's been dropped at this moment, but it seems likely soon and definitely before next season.

Given that Laurent Mekies, his team principal, was taking about how "this may have been Daniel’s last race", it sounds very much like it's a case of simply when Red Bull are going to make the announcement.

One thing that is worth noting is that Ricciardo has been rather open about his complete and total disinterest in learning anything about the technical side of the sport. When he was at Red Bull, he joked about Verstappen being "a nerd" for taking the lead in the technical debriefing sessions and spending time studying the technical side of the sport, and commented that "when he’s in engineering briefings and talking about some details on the car, I don’t even know what they are".

That was back in 2016, but his attitude has remained very similar since then - in 2022, for example, he said that "I like not really knowing a whole lot. I like investing more of my energy into the driving and I like just being a little bit blasé about it all.", justifying that attitude by saying he believed that approaching things "with a bit more of a carefree attitude" made him more relaxed and helped him drive better.

I think that probably also plays a significant part in the problems that Ricciardo has faced, especially in more recent years. Ricciardo seems to have relied more on his natural abilities, and I wonder if he also got a bit too used to his team mates - figures like Vettel, Verstappen, Hulkenberg and Norris - compensating for his lack of technical knowledge. It is also worth noting that Tsunoda had talked about how he'd been "a bit lazy" in previous season, but his improved form this season and his increasing dominance over Ricciardo has coincided with a change in his driver management team that's seen him putting more effort into his physical training and his technical training.

The shift to the current ground effect cars has probably exacerbated those failures to a far greater extent, as it generally seems that the operating window of those cars have become much narrower compared to the flat bottomed cars. Added to that, it's been noted that the switch to ground effect cars has tended to shift the handling balance towards a tendency to understeer, since the centre of pressure seems to have shifted further rearwards and it seems some teams find it easier to increase rear downforce levels compared to front downforce levels.

Ricciardo seemed to rely quite heavily on braking late and pitching the car into the corner, requiring a front end that could react quite quickly. That style of driving does not seem to be particularly suited to the more recent cars, and it seems that, when at McLaren, the telemetry data suggested that lack of confidence in the front end meant he was losing on corner exit as he tended to lift off the throttle and bleed off speed when he didn't need to, especially in slower corners. That does also seem to have been an issue at RB, where they commented that his driving style seemed to have changed a lot since he was at Red Bull - the implication being that it was for the worse - when they put him in the simulator.

I don't think it's quite that he's "stopped caring quite so much" - it seems he's never really cared that much to begin with, and perhaps always lacked the necessary self drive to truly succeed. Perhaps what we're seeing is the effect of age robbing him of a bit of that extra edge combined with car designs that don't compliment his strengths and accentuate his weaknesses, plus poor technical knowledge that might help him adapt to the qualities of the current cars and a lack of interest in trying to learn how to adapt.

[Row Man Gross-Gene]

Thanks Mario, I had forgotten the degree to which he disdained the technical side of things. That will certainly have been no help in getting him out of the hole he's been in. But it's also fine... some F1 drivers come and go like this. Not that they are similar in temperament, but his record is similar to someone like Carlos Reutemann. And he's relatively well-thought-of. It's OK to be quick, win some races, and then move off. It will probably end up being Bottas' story and Sainz's story and many others before and since.

[CoopsII]

Reading Mario's (is that his real name? Can't remember from back in the day actually) thorough analysis on Danny Ric it could've almost been describing Kiki Raikkonen for much of his career, another instinctive driver. Obviously Kimi managed to nick a WDC and twice as many wins as Ricciardo but I think he'll be remembered more fondly, I'm sad to say. 'How cool is coldness' indeed.

Maybe Ricciardo was too friendly and nice?

[Row Man Gross-Gene]

Well, it's official now: https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2024/ ... -of-season


Was he too nice? I don't think so, certainly not on the track. I'm sure he'd have preferred to have won a championship, but I think he's got a decent place in F1 history... just winning 8 races puts him in pretty rarified air.

[Har1MAS1415]

Do Red Bul just have a thing about screwing Aussie drivers over?

First Webber, now Danny Ric.

[mario]

Reading Mario's (is that his real name? Can't remember from back in the day actually) thorough analysis on Danny Ric it could've almost been describing Kiki Raikkonen for much of his career, another instinctive driver. Obviously Kimi managed to nick a WDC and twice as many wins as Ricciardo but I think he'll be remembered more fondly, I'm sad to say. 'How cool is coldness' indeed.

Maybe Ricciardo was too friendly and nice?

Since you ask - no, it's not my real name, but rather a nod to Mario Andretti.

It's interesting that you draw a parallel with Kimi, as he was given credit for the quality of his feedback during his tenure at McLaren and Lotus, and to some extent at Ferrari too. Newey complimented him for being very precise with his feedback, Whitmarsh stated that he thought that Kimi's technical knowledge was underestimated by his rivals and Ross Brawn commended him for the effort he put in working with his engineers at Ferrari when he switched over to them. Towards the latter end of his career, Beat Zehnder also complimented Kimi's technical knowledge and quality of feedback too.

About the only exception to the rule seems to be Domenicali, who justified replacing Kimi with Alonso on the ground that Kimi was not communicative enough, whilst Alonso was better at communicating with his engineers and firing up the team.

Do Red Bul just have a thing about screwing Aussie drivers over?

First Webber, now Danny Ric.

It could be said that it cuts both ways with Ricciardo.

On the one hand, they have been getting criticism for being very clumsy with Ricciardo, as they're accused of having not made it clear to him that he was being dropped until the chatter in the press couldn't be ignored any more (particularly given Lawson got the news about two weeks earlier that he would be replacing Ricciardo).

On the other hand, Ricciardo's performances at McLaren did a lot of damage to his reputation as a driver, and had it not been for Red Bull stepping in to give him a seat, it'd be the way that he was pushed out of McLaren that we'd be remembering him for instead.

[CoopsII]

Fascinating, I didn't know that about the quality of Kimis technical feedback, I guess I'd assumed too much based on the perception of him which, come to think about it, came from the fans anyway.

On Danny Ric, I hope he keeps racing something, he's a great addition to any series.

[Har1MAS1415]

Reading Mario's (is that his real name? Can't remember from back in the day actually) thorough analysis on Danny Ric it could've almost been describing Kiki Raikkonen for much of his career, another instinctive driver. Obviously Kimi managed to nick a WDC and twice as many wins as Ricciardo but I think he'll be remembered more fondly, I'm sad to say. 'How cool is coldness' indeed.

Maybe Ricciardo was too friendly and nice?

Since you ask - no, it's not my real name, but rather a nod to Mario Andretti.

It's interesting that you draw a parallel with Kimi, as he was given credit for the quality of his feedback during his tenure at McLaren and Lotus, and to some extent at Ferrari too. Newey complimented him for being very precise with his feedback, Whitmarsh stated that he thought that Kimi's technical knowledge was underestimated by his rivals and Ross Brawn commended him for the effort he put in working with his engineers at Ferrari when he switched over to them. Towards the latter end of his career, Beat Zehnder also complimented Kimi's technical knowledge and quality of feedback too.

About the only exception to the rule seems to be Domenicali, who justified replacing Kimi with Alonso on the ground that Kimi was not communicative enough, whilst Alonso was better at communicating with his engineers and firing up the team.

Do Red Bul just have a thing about screwing Aussie drivers over?

First Webber, now Danny Ric.

It could be said that it cuts both ways with Ricciardo.

On the one hand, they have been getting criticism for being very clumsy with Ricciardo, as they're accused of having not made it clear to him that he was being dropped until the chatter in the press couldn't be ignored any more (particularly given Lawson got the news about two weeks earlier that he would be replacing Ricciardo).

On the other hand, Ricciardo's performances at McLaren did a lot of damage to his reputation as a driver, and had it not been for Red Bull stepping in to give him a seat, it'd be the way that he was pushed out of McLaren that we'd be remembering him for instead.

True.

Maybe McLaren were just more invested in Norris and that contributed to Danny Ric's performances with them?

[mario]

Fascinating, I didn't know that about the quality of Kimis technical feedback, I guess I'd assumed too much based on the perception of him which, come to think about it, came from the fans anyway.

On Danny Ric, I hope he keeps racing something, he's a great addition to any series.

Yes, I would agree that the perception that the fans had of Kimi - i.e. being very reluctant to talk to people - meant that he'd also be rather poor at providing feedback or otherwise working with his engineers.

That does seem to be a case where the public perception was out of step with what he was like in private. There have been a couple of journalists who did get to know Kimi in more private settings, and they commented that, when away from the limelight and in an environment where he felt comfortable, he tended to be more talkative and friendly. In this case, being in the more private setting of the pit garage or in the debriefing room with the other engineers with people he'd got to know over a period of time, it perhaps makes sense that he'd be more talkative in that environment.

In the case of Lotus at least, part of the reason why they did want him there was because they thought that the quality of his feedback would help them move forwards. It did work for the most part, although it did occasionally backfire - one of the reasons why Kimi did relatively poorly in the 2012 Monaco GP was because the team had developed a street circuit specific steering rack that he didn't gel with during FP1 and asked them to remove it during the session, against the advice of the team. As it was, they lost a lot of time in FP1 changing it, and with the subsequent sessions being rained off, the lack of running meant they couldn't dial the set up back in.

Maybe McLaren were just more invested in Norris and that contributed to Danny Ric's performances with them?

Whilst it's true that, having been embedded within the team for so long, McLaren might be rather invested in Norris, that does not seem to have been too much of an impediment to Piastri recently, and Sainz seemed to be able to cope too.

There was talk that the MCL35M and MCL36 did have some strange handling traits - in particular, there were reports that the drivers had to be unusually aggressive with the weight transfer on turn in on the MCL36 to maximise cornering speeds in lower speed corners, which did require some counter intuitive driving behaviour. It was something that Norris was able to adapt to, but it seems Ricciardo struggled much more and could never fully adapt to that behaviour.

In that situation, I could see Ricciardo's tendency to be a bit disinterested in engaging on the technical side hurting him more. It could also perhaps explain why Red Bull commented about Ricciardo's driving style being rather different to what they were used to by the time that they got him back in their simulator - it might have been from how Ricciardo had been trying to adapt to the differences in handling balance of the current ground effect cars, and especially the unusual traits of the MCL36.

[Wallio]

Do Red Bul just have a thing about screwing Aussie drivers over?

First Webber,

That's certainly a take......

[dr-baker]

Do Red Bul just have a thing about screwing Aussie drivers over?

First Webber,

That's certainly a take......

Multi 21.

[Wallio]

Multi 21.

Multi 21 is really the one and only case of it. (Silverstone 2010 to a lesser extent).

I know I'll catch heat for this since the (original) site is/was Australian and Webber is VERY popular on here, but, in F1 at least, he just wasn't that good. He ranks either 3rd or 4th on RBR all time in wins (depending on if you count DC or not) and is only one above Danny Ric (two if we give him "Multi-21") and just three above Checo, who is hardly a world beater. Webber was a more "strawman" version of Leclerc: Great qualifier, but pretty meh on Sundays, and absolutely horrendous on starts. And if you go back to his Jag and Williams days, it was very much the same thing. People used to claim the Jags were just bad off the line, but the pattern repeated everywhere else. So much so that SRX poked fun at this in their initial season, (in which Webber was contracted to race before visa issues stopped it) by tweeting him, "its ok, we use rolling starts."

Webber's "memorable" F1 moments consist of Multi-21, "Not bawd for eh Numbuh 2 driver, eh?", His incredible Valencia crash, and causing the crash that ended the 2003 Sau Paulo madness. Post retirement he's known for being the guy who helped Piastri flee Alpine via Alonso.

Now that said, he really was much better in sports cars, but even then I think most people only remember the Mercedes flip, rather than the Porsche wins.

[Har1MAS1415]

Multi 21.

Multi 21 is really the one and only case of it. (Silverstone 2010 to a lesser extent).

I know I'll catch heat for this since the (original) site is/was Australian and Webber is VERY popular on here, but, in F1 at least, he just wasn't that good. He ranks either 3rd or 4th on RBR all time in wins (depending on if you count DC or not) and is only one above Danny Ric (two if we give him "Multi-21") and just three above Checo, who is hardly a world beater. Webber was a more "strawman" version of Leclerc: Great qualifier, but pretty meh on Sundays, and absolutely horrendous on starts. And if you go back to his Jag and Williams days, it was very much the same thing. People used to claim the Jags were just bad off the line, but the pattern repeated everywhere else. So much so that SRX poked fun at this in their initial season, (in which Webber was contracted to race before visa issues stopped it) by tweeting him, "its ok, we use rolling starts."

Webber's "memorable" F1 moments consist of Multi-21, "Not bawd for eh Numbuh 2 driver, eh?", His incredible Valencia crash, and causing the crash that ended the 2003 Sau Paulo madness. Post retirement he's known for being the guy who helped Piastri flee Alpine via Alonso.

Now that said, he really was much better in sports cars, but even then I think most people only remember the Mercedes flip, rather than the Porsche wins.

Didn't they also blame Webber for Turkey 2010?

Also, what about Webber's debut in 2002? 5th in his home GP in a Minardi.

[mario]

Multi 21.

Multi 21 is really the one and only case of it. (Silverstone 2010 to a lesser extent).

I know I'll catch heat for this since the (original) site is/was Australian and Webber is VERY popular on here, but, in F1 at least, he just wasn't that good. He ranks either 3rd or 4th on RBR all time in wins (depending on if you count DC or not) and is only one above Danny Ric (two if we give him "Multi-21") and just three above Checo, who is hardly a world beater. Webber was a more "strawman" version of Leclerc: Great qualifier, but pretty meh on Sundays, and absolutely horrendous on starts. And if you go back to his Jag and Williams days, it was very much the same thing. People used to claim the Jags were just bad off the line, but the pattern repeated everywhere else. So much so that SRX poked fun at this in their initial season, (in which Webber was contracted to race before visa issues stopped it) by tweeting him, "its ok, we use rolling starts."

Webber's "memorable" F1 moments consist of Multi-21, "Not bawd for eh Numbuh 2 driver, eh?", His incredible Valencia crash, and causing the crash that ended the 2003 Sau Paulo madness. Post retirement he's known for being the guy who helped Piastri flee Alpine via Alonso.

Now that said, he really was much better in sports cars, but even then I think most people only remember the Mercedes flip, rather than the Porsche wins.

Didn't they also blame Webber for Turkey 2010?

Also, what about Webber's debut in 2002? 5th in his home GP in a Minardi.

Marko was the one who blamed Webber the most heavily in the press for the collision and insisted that Webber should have made more room for Vettel.

Horner took a bit more of a moderate line compared to Marko. Horner's approach was to downplay some of Marko's comments and lean more towards the stance of it being "an unfortunate racing incident" that didn't explicitly blame either driver for the collision, although he did make a comment about Webber "squeezing Vettel" that was considered by many to be Horner's way of mildly rebuking Webber.

It seems that there was perhaps a split between Horner and Marko on that front, with the latter being much more openly favouring Vettel, whilst the former seemed to be a bit more neutral (although Webber suggested in his autobiography that Marko seemed to be using his influence with Mateschitz to undermine Horner on that front).

[Wallio]

[/quote]
Marko was the one who blamed Webber the most heavily in the press for the collision and insisted that Webber should have made more room for Vettel.

Horner took a bit more of a moderate line compared to Marko. Horner's approach was to downplay some of Marko's comments and lean more towards the stance of it being "an unfortunate racing incident" that didn't explicitly blame either driver for the collision, although he did make a comment about Webber "squeezing Vettel" that was considered by many to be Horner's way of mildly rebuking Webber.

It seems that there was perhaps a split between Horner and Marko on that front, with the latter being much more openly favouring Vettel, whilst the former seemed to be a bit more neutral (although Webber suggested in his autobiography that Marko seemed to be using his influence with Mateschitz to undermine Horner on that front).
[/quote]


Yeah, I don't view Marko as part of RBR "proper". Didn't then, still don't now. If someone wants to make the argument that Marko screwed Webber, yeah I can see some truth to that.

I did forget about Melbourne '02 but IMO Webber's comments on it afterwards (he was VERY against going up on the podium and was mad at Stoddart) kinda ruin it.

[Har1MAS1415]

Marko was the one who blamed Webber the most heavily in the press for the collision and insisted that Webber should have made more room for Vettel.

Horner took a bit more of a moderate line compared to Marko. Horner's approach was to downplay some of Marko's comments and lean more towards the stance of it being "an unfortunate racing incident" that didn't explicitly blame either driver for the collision, although he did make a comment about Webber "squeezing Vettel" that was considered by many to be Horner's way of mildly rebuking Webber.

It seems that there was perhaps a split between Horner and Marko on that front, with the latter being much more openly favouring Vettel, whilst the former seemed to be a bit more neutral (although Webber suggested in his autobiography that Marko seemed to be using his influence with Mateschitz to undermine Horner on that front).
[/quote]


Yeah, I don't view Marko as part of RBR "proper". Didn't then, still don't now. If someone wants to make the argument that Marko screwed Webber, yeah I can see some truth to that.

I did forget about Melbourne '02 but IMO Webber's comments on it afterwards (he was VERY against going up on the podium and was mad at Stoddart) kinda ruin it.
[/quote]

Also qualifying 3rd a couple of times with Jaguar in 2003 and on the front row at Malaysia in 2004.

[takagi_for_the_win]

Do Red Bul just have a thing about screwing Aussie drivers over?

First Webber,

That's certainly a take......

Yeah, not sure that Toro Rosso giving a 35 year old who's a good 5 years past his best the boot after giving him nearly a full season out the goodness of their hearts is "screwing him over". To each their own though.

[mario]

Yeah, I don't view Marko as part of RBR "proper". Didn't then, still don't now. If someone wants to make the argument that Marko screwed Webber, yeah I can see some truth to that.

I did forget about Melbourne '02 but IMO Webber's comments on it afterwards (he was VERY against going up on the podium and was mad at Stoddart) kinda ruin it.

Helmut Marko has been a director of Red Bull Racing Ltd since December 2004, which does mean that he has actually been part of the senior management of Red Bull Racing for slightly longer than Horner has been (Horner became the team principal in January 2005 and only became a director of the team in March 2007).

That said, there is always the question of how much of Marko's power was through official channels and how much came in the unofficial capacity as the "l'Éminence Rouge" to Dietrich Mateschitz, and thus exerting power through Dietrich's role at the parent company down into Red Bull Racing.

[Rob Dylan]

To respond to the claims of a few days ago, I would say that above what Wikipedia can tell you, the actual experience of watching seasons like 2010 and 2011 were a very different story, and the most important factor that the written word and retrospective dealings miss out on is the public perception of how Red Bull dealt with their drivers. Oh yes, they did continuously discuss their fairness to Seb and Mark, but unlike Mercedes a few years further down the line, they did absolutely nothing to actually make a public showing of unity and deal with things behind closed doors.

Turkey 2010 is the first and most important example imo. With all the world's cameras on them, Horner and co. gave Vettel a great big hug on the pitwall when he had taken himself and his teammate off the track, cost them a win and 28 points in the constructors' championship. If they had done the correct thing, and discussed everything backdoors and dealt with it professionally, the perception would be different. But when the driver (I would say) the majority public believes was at fault or at least more at fault gets a big hug from the management and "aw bless, poor Seb" while his teammate is still out there with a wounded car holding on to third, it absolutely stinks of favouritism.

Had the roles been reversed, can any of us imagine Mark Webber on the pitwall having cost his team a win, getting a big old hug from Horner while Seb is screaming over the radio in a wounded car?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHb1y9TJMV4 (there's at least a very short showing of it around 4 minutes into the retrospective highlights clip)

[Har1MAS1415]

Do Red Bul just have a thing about screwing Aussie drivers over?

First Webber,

That's certainly a take......

Yeah, not sure that Toro Rosso giving a 35 year old who's a good 5 years past his best the boot after giving him nearly a full season out the goodness of their hearts is "screwing him over". To each their own though.

Bad choice of words on my part but Red Bull aren't exactly famous for how they treat Aussie drivers for the right reasons.

[Salamander]

I don't think it's so much a problem with Aussie drivers as just in general not respecting any driver who doesn't win everything in sight. It just appears this way because Red Bull have employed more Australian drivers than pretty much any other team.