Motorsport Off Topic Thread

[Janesy B]

Fell in love with this today

Lotus 101 by Bryan Janes, on Flickr

This made quite a nice noise

Arrows A18 by Bryan Janes, on Flickr

 

[MagicBoy]

Pretty sure that's a Lotus 101...

 

[Janesy B]

I'll just pretend I didn't do that

 

[MarcLister]

Pretty sure that's a Lotus 101...

OK, so how did you know that it was a 101 and not the 99T. Was it the sidepod?

 

[MagicBoy]

I'll just pretend I didn't do that

I saw nothing.

OK, so how did you know that it was a 101 and not the 99T. Was it the sidepod?

I'm an F1 geek.

99T was the Honda powered turbo car from 1987. First Lotus with the desert themed cigarette brand so I can understand the mistake. Most obvious giveaway is the overhead air intake on the 101, the 80s turbo cars (hence the T suffix in the model) didn't have them.

Telling the 101 and 102 apart would be somewhat more difficult. Sidepod should do that, the 102 had a Lambo V12 so needed a lot more cooling.

 

[Janesy B]

There was a 99T there too which was in a marquee so I wrongly assumed it was the same car without really looking.

 

[MarcLister]

I'm an F1 geek.

99T was the Honda powered turbo car from 1987. First Lotus with the desert themed cigarette brand so I can understand the mistake. Most obvious giveaway is the overhead air intake on the 101, the 80s turbo cars (hence the T suffix in the model) didn't have them.

Telling the 101 and 102 apart would be somewhat more difficult. Sidepod should do that, the 102 had a Lambo V12 so needed a lot more cooling.

Cool but sad.

 

[MooMoo444]

Seems like Ferrari might be losing both their drivers at the end of the season?

 

[Skeeter]

Sounds rather unlikely? It would mean buying both of them out of their contracts, and there is nobody on the market you would consider better than them, without taking a risk.

 

[DiCe!]

Sounds rather unlikely? It would mean buying both of them out of their contracts, and there is nobody on the market you would consider better than them, without taking a risk.

Take with a truck load of salt, I heard that there is something in Alonso's contract that says if Ferrari are not in the top 3 it makes it much easier for him to leave....and look...they just dropped the 4th.

 

[MooMoo444]

Can't see it myself either but I just noticed the article up on BBC

 

[DiCe!]

Thats a lie they are back to 3rd now so ho hum.

 

[Skeeter]

Take with a truck load of salt, I heard that there is something in Alonso's contract that says if Ferrari are not in the top 3 it makes it much easier for him to leave....and look...they just dropped the 4th.

Yeah I would expect there to be performance clauses for both parties.

But the bigger issue for me is that even if they could drop both of them, who would they replace them with? There are a few drivers who I would like to see get the seat (Hulk, Bianchi, Bottas, etc) but they would all be big risks, especially if getting them means dropping "widely regarded as one of the best drivers on the grid" Alonso, and WDC Kimi.

 

[MooMoo444]

I didn't see it as Ferrari dropping the drivers, I read it as the drivers dropping Ferrari.

 

[Skeeter]

I didn't see it as Ferrari dropping the drivers, I read it as the drivers dropping Ferrari.

Same argument applies though, where would they go? If they were to walk away from Ferrari it would be because the car isn't good enough, but who else has open seats thats a better option? McLaren maybe, and that's about it?

Seems to me to just be one of the standard silly season runaway train stories where someone has extrapolated a rumour to create an unconnected fictional scenario. Like when Horner saying Renault need to buck their ideas up lead to "Red Bull to build their own engines!" headlines.

 

[Glaucus]

Alonso has got a get out clause if he's not in the top three, they've talked about it often in skyf1 and Peter Windsor. But where would he go.
Mclaren is the only option. It's a risk. but probably less of a risk than staying at Ferrari. Still can't really see it, unless McLaren pay silly money.

 

[kaiowas]

Mclaren is the only option. It's a risk. but probably less of a risk than staying at Ferrari. Still can't really see it, unless McLaren pay silly money.

Don't forget the Honda angle. The current driver line up at McLaren doesn't look strong enough to do justice to their investment so there's a reasonable chance that Honda will dig deep to bring in a "name" for next season (of which there will be few options available and given a free choice Alonso would be near the top of most peoples lists anyway) and who knows what level of performance we will see from them, Lewis moving to Mercedes looked like a gamble but has paid off...

Kimi on the other hand has no reason to stick around, he'll probably just go and play with snowmobiles or something. He's clearly not enjoying himself this season.

 

[drunkenmaster]

Mclaren isn't the only option, which team is at the moment second fastest and after a few dodgy races have been pushing Merc(not really close but only team getting close). Williams, who have done a lot of rebuilding themselves, have the best engine going in to next season and a good overall package.

Currently Williams have two vulnerable drivers, in that I mean Alonso is a huge name with a lot of sponsorship clout and a lot of support. Massa is making a fool of himself this season and while Bottas looks very promising he doesn't have the money, fans or coverage that Alonso brings.

If he was to go anywhere it would be Williams for next season. Mclaren are exceptionally unlikely to be competitive next season. Ignoring the engine and the almost zero chance of it matching Merc, Mclaren with their current team are lacking badly in every other area even with the best engine. They have people coming in but pretty much next year. It will take time for new people to find a direction and they have to start somewhat from scratch for a new engine. Even if Honda was magically the best engine, the rest of the car won't be on par with other top teams for at least another season, maybe two and that is if they get the right people and make all the right decisions.

Williams look the second best team currently, Red Bull look sporadically competitive but due to the style of engine this year, a engine disadvantage is hurting a lot more this year than last year. I don't get the feeling Renault are going to overcome their engine deficit for next season and with seemingly Lotus moving on to Merc, it's going to be one less team running Renault next season making the data gathering on a new engine harder again for a team who are behind. Renault will likely have the biggest changes of the three current engine makers, and less people to test them. If they have made a significant step forward they might not be able to utilise it till later in the season.

I think Merc will obviously win this year but a Mercedes power car is almost certain to win next year at the very least if not the year after also.

Alonso's best shot is a drive in a Merc powered car, failing it being Mercedes themselves, the next best car is Williams and he can frankly easily get a seat there. They'd fall over themselves to push Massa out to get him.

The idea of Massa's engineer again telling Massa "Alonso is faster than you" is amazing.

 

[Skeeter]

Interesting. You say Williams is a better bet that McLaren. Williams having a positive blip in performance going on the last ~10 years, while McLaren are having a negative blip. Isn't that a bit short sighted? If I was looking for a team most likely to give a title fighting car in the next 3 years, it would be McLaren over Williams every day. I would chose Ferrari over Williams too.

 

[Lopéz]

Fell in love with this today

Lotus 101 by Bryan Janes, on Flickr

One of the cleanest, best looking F1 shapes. Right up there with the Leyton-House CG901, Ferrari 642 and the McLaren MP4/5. The very early 90's was a great time for good looking F1 cars, even the also-rans were decent looking (FWIW I prefer the early 102, but I can live with a 101)