F1 - 2018 Spanish Grand Prix

[Brad_C]

Originally Posted By: Carmudgeon

Well, from today's news, it appears that RB/TR does want to spring a surprise.


Indeed. I suppose from hindsight I shouldn't be surprised. Marko has a habit of being a right ruthless front-bottom to any driver he didn't personally groom/promote. Drivers in which he has a personal investment who similarly underperform appear to be given much more leeway (JEV for example).

Have a read about some of the stuff he said to Webber over the years (being an inherited driver rather than one groomed by the RB stable). He's quite a piece of work.

Interesting times ahead. I'd like to see Hartley do well, I think he has quite a lot of potential but thus far the track record hasn't been great.

Maybe they are a little shallow in the talent pool.

 

[Garak]

I imagine Dr. Marko is one of those special people on the grid who is especially difficult to deal with, which is an amazing feat in an environment filled with lunatics.

With respect to the talent pool, I gather the gamble on Hartley might not have been taken had WEC seats suddenly not dried up.

 

[Carmudgeon]

Ganassi is the probably the one who made out the best on the Hartley deal.

He got a buyout from RB for Harley's contract, probably pays Jones less than Hartley would have received, and while Jones has been jekyll/hyde inconsistent, at least has a couple podiums and top 10s to his credit this season, so there is some potential.

The state of RB's driver program has been examined elsewhere, and none of it seems to be a surprise.

I was curious to see how Hartley would have done in an IndyCar. But I don't think anyone will hold his F1 experience against him, so he can likely find a place back in sports car.

 

[Garak]

Agreed. I'm sure he can find somewhere to drive reasonably soon if he were punted. Before too long, I suspect we will see more prototypes show up in WEC, too, after a couple bad years here.

 

[billt460]

Originally Posted By: Carmudgeon
The state of RB's driver program has been examined elsewhere, and none of it seems to be a surprise..... I was curious to see how Hartley would have done in an IndyCar. But I don't think anyone will hold his F1 experience against him, so he can likely find a place back in sports car.


This whole thing with Hartley reminds me of the Scott Speed disaster. The only difference is it played out a lot cheaper for them. Red Bull spent a fortune trying to "develop" Scott Speeds "career". The whole thing turned into a big, expensive farce. That guy couldn't win a race if he was the only one in it. In spite of Red Bull investing an estimated $30 MILLION on his disastrous "career". You can't "search" for Formula 1 talent by picking some guy that wins a "driving contest" that's graded on a Bell Curve, with a cool sounding last name.

You have to be able to recognize it when it shows up. It can't be groomed and created. The top level of talent will always sift itself out of the mix. In Scott Speed's case it went the other way. He went from a starting drivers job in Formula-1, to racing compacts in parking lots. Because that's where he belonged from the get go. It just took $30 million for Red Bull to realize it.

In comparison look at Red Bull with Vettel. Both he and Speed came into the sport around the same time, (2005 - 2007). Vettel looked talented from day one. Especially considering how young he was at the time they grabbed him. Granted he most likely would have had nowhere near the career he has had if he remained with Williams.

Now Red Bull seems to have made yet another blunder with Verstappen. He is not maturing as a driver. At least not as much as they had hoped. But in Red Bull's defense, any team could have made that mistake. The kid showed unbelievable talent out of the box. He just can't seem to calm down. (His father never did either). Hartley was just a bad choice. Much like Daniil Kvyat. They'll dump him and move on. As the saying goes, "Better luck next time".

 

[A_Harman]

It's enough to make a race team leader pull his hair out: how do you look at a young driver, and see if he has that special "something" that will make him magical in an F1 car? If somebody is great in sports cars or F2, it doesn't guarantee magic in F1. Going way back, before Michael Schumacher came into F1, he was driving in the Mercedes WEC junior team with Heinz-Harald Frentzen. It was thought that Frentzen was the better of the two, yet when he got to F1, he wasn't magical, as Michael Schumacher was. You just never know until the kid straps into an F1 car and goes at it in a race.

 

[Garak]

Yes, it has to be maddening. Maybe that's why Dr. Marko is difficult. That's his entire job, after all, well, at least most of it. I maintain he's Horner's boss behind the scenes, albeit not on paper.