Soldato
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Motorsport Off Topic Thread
- Thread starter Shimmy
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Man of Honour
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I can't see Ben Sulayem remaining as FIA president for long if the various allegations are proven. Time to get a racer in charge; I'll go for Allan McNish or Alex Wurz
Brawn, if you can persuade him to stop fishing...
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Yeah good should actually; he might be one of the few that could actually bring Liberty and the FIA together given his previous role at Liberty
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Wurz is a great shout, met him years back and he's a very impressive individual.
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Gerhard Berger has said that he thinks Horner and Marko leave Red Bull and Max goes Merc, he's good friends with Helmut so makes you wonder if there is some major war going on at Red Bull.
Mark Hughes has just put this article out as well https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/horner-verstappen-red-bull-f1-upheaval-changes/
Mark Hughes has just put this article out as well https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/horner-verstappen-red-bull-f1-upheaval-changes/
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I don't really understand why Max would leave/would want to/would have to?
Doesn't make sense. Who the team principal is surely doesn't make much difference to him. Surely all he cares about is being in the best car, and at the moment that is the RB (and it's currently miles ahead of the competition).
I suppose for 26 it might make sense as RB might not necessarily be the fastest car then, but Mercedes could not be either.
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I wonder how many expletives Berger used?
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1. Newey will most likely be gone soon
2. Red Bull are expected to be at a disadvantage for the 2026 season and possibly beyond that.
3. Max wants to win as many titles as possible before he hits 30 as he wants to go and race in other series during his prime (ie: not in his mid-late 30s) thus he's not going to want to mess around at Red Bull from 2026 onwards if they aren't instantly challenging for titles.
Thats my guess anyway, on top of that maybe they see the writing on the wall with this supposed power struggle at Red Bull
Or it's all nonsense, or at least parts of it are. Bit too much smoke for it all to be BS though imo
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Just a hypothetical story, I'd give it no credence despite Hughes's credibility..
This seems to be commonly accepted but I guess I missed the memo. Why, exactly? Surely in reality nobody really knows what new regs will bring (although ground effect was always going to work to Newey’s favour)
Major new engine regs should favour the teams with the best engine building skills. If they keep Ford then they should be in an okay place, but Ford - for all their skills - haven't built F1 engines in a long time. Honda, Ferrari and Merc have. I think there's quite a lot of assumption going on there.
That’s assuming Ford are still in. Pinch to mountain of salt required but there’s rumours Ford are still looking at ways they can back out of the deal.
It wouldn’t surprise me if that’s true though even if only for contingency reasons.
It wouldn’t surprise me if that’s true though even if only for contingency reasons.
Indeed. And if they're not, then Red Bull would end up with Audi engines, most likely, or possibly even different engines in their two teams. Competing against the works team, late to the party, and with an outfit inexperienced in F1 engine development. What could possibly go wrong?
I would be surprised if Ford aren't looking at ways to exit, whether or not they're actually planning to use them - and, for the record, I don't think they're looking for the door just yet.
Soldato
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I was about to rebuke you for omitting Renault from that list and then I started trying to think back to when they made an a competitive F1 engine in the hybrid era…
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I half wonder if Ford did pull out if the Audi engine might magically appear with a "Porsche" badge on it..... But like you I doubt Ford are looking for a way out
He seemed to me to be struggling badly even before this. The FIA and it's main cash cow falling out just seems unsustainable and that seems to have got worse over time. But he's half way through a four year term, I think there's a good chance he'll see it out. His replacement will have a lot of fixing up to do.
He may not have been competing at the highest level, but Sulayem was a racer and a very successful one at that - absolutely dominating the Middle East Rally Championship.
I could totally see this actually.
Unfortunately I have a decent imagination and now I can see it
I really wish alpine would just leave and put me out of my misery.
Read a few articles drumming up "hope" for them. But it seems bad. Looks like there are problems all over the car.
I mean they are still carrying the engine deficit.
I'm not sure if Renault will have the stamina to be at the back or near back for 2 years (that's my prediction).
They've jumped in and out before.
Its worse than just being at the back. They come across as a horrible place.
Its alpine in f1 doing more bad than good for them as an advert? I certainly wouldn't buy one!