Jenson : I won't be destroyed

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Notice the headline The Sun use,''Button enjoys Lewis dig''

When infact there is no ''dig'' whatsoever

I hope this isn't the start of the gutter press trying to stir up civil war

no way
If you want to see the truth you are better to compare the same track from this year to the same track from 20 years ago you will clearly see there was more overtaking on the same track years ago than this year.
On thing about Jenson and Lewis that is a given is they will get on far better than the red team.
It will be great to see calm professionalism in McLaren whilst the reds have a civil war

its the sun what do you expect
It surprises me anyone here would visit that shite
I thought everyone (here) was far more intelligent than the suns typical readers are.

Oi, i got 6 GCSE's i'll have you know

Just scouring for footy transfer gossip and seen it, the Daily Mail have the same story but without the sensationalist headline

id rather the cars of now than the cars of 20 yrs ago and wont trade the increase in speed over those years just so everyone can overtake easier.

as you will see, the top racers will more often than not still find a way to overtake when the circuit is decent enough....for me that o.k.

He has obliterated his teammate 2 years running, won 2 races unexpectedly this year, and beat a double world champion in his rookie year. His accomplishments stand out against anybody's so early in his career, despite the fact that he has had a handy car for a couple seasons. Button's accomplishments are nowhere near that. If you count only championships then maybe you may be blind to the truth.

Just the same, I don't want to predict the outcome for next year, though if forced I would put my money on Lewis. But Button's smooth style may be a godsend in the tyre preservation format, and may just tip the balance in his favour, though I expect Lewis will clean up in qualifying, his outright pace is probably beyond Button's best.


Cooper

I don't quite get this perception about Hamiltons alleged "outright pace". Quite a few times the team had to fuel Kova, not exactly a world beater by anyones standards, artificially heavy to make sure Lewis would end up in front of him on the grid. Even so it didn't always work.

As I see it, Hamiltons undeniable strenghts are his speed in the rain, or generally slippery conditions. There he is indeed the benchmark of recent years. But on a dry track over one all-out lap he hasn't been that special so far.

So I wouldn't declare the qualifying battle between him and Button over already, especially as I don't see the team pushover Button, strategy-wise, as they used to do with Kova.

I guess McLaren's view is a bit more realistic than Hamilton's fans. The recent statement how they look forward to exploit particulary Buttons excellence on high-speed tracks gives a firm hint to that, IMO.

Nigel Roebuck has written a very good piece on Jenson vs Lewis in the latest motorsport magazine; he compares it to Giles vs Jody Scheckter at Ferrari. Hamilton for him, is like Giles in being brave and exciting to watch, but he makes the point that Button, being slightly more reserved than hamilton, might well do what scheckter did to Giles and win the championship ahead of lewis. He uses the monza race from last year to typify this argument: Hamilton, brave and exciting to many, crashed out going for 2nd place. Jenson on the other hand, he suggests, would have settled for 3rd in the same situation. Although many fans will take the Hamilton approach, points mean prizes....

It was actually quite nice to read a reserved judgement on this years mclaren battle rather than the usual X will wipe the floor with Y, etc, etc.

He finished level on points with Alonso

Not expected to win ? He started on pole in Singapore, i'll give you Hungary

Button's accomplishment's nowhere near ? Correct me if i'm wrong but they've both got 1 title, and Jenson wrapped his up earlier and won more races

Like i said, i've got nothing against the guy, and i'm sure at the end of his career he'll be seen as one of the greats, but at this moment in time he isn't on Schumacher's or Alonso's level when it comes to achievments, like Allen is making out

Allen needs to stop swinging from Lewis' nut's

I didn't sense the sarcasm until that point. You're a funny guy

He's fantastic in changeable conditions

Watching his control and poise in Spa while Kimi was all over the place like a piss head outside a kebab shop was fantastic

All that is meaningless in the context. A proven world champion wouldn't have trouble defending 17 point leads over two races. Jenson led from start to finish all year with a higher end margin, but is given less praise on his WDC.

Jensons championship was the most boring championship since Michael and Ferrari 2002-2004
I ticked of the 2009 season after the first 6 races, the BRAWN car seemed to be unbeatable
it was only a question of time, when the lead is big enough to fix both titles (WDC & WCC)

It looked like it was to easy for Jenson, to win the WDC.

It didn't for his fans, i was shitting bricks towards the end

Well that's what fans do right? I was a Hill fan back in the day, I know he wasn't fastest but he's a nice guy, and indeed 96 was a lot more exciting for me than it should've been for a neutral viewer. Monza tyres and all.

Last year, well eh kinda boring I guess, interesting.. but not edge of seat stuff

The amount of evidence to support your point of view is insignificant to the evidence that supports mine. I am not enamoured by either driver, but I have been rather pleased that Button won the championship this year, I thought he deserved it. That said:

If you think Alonso is special, then you can only conclude that Hamilton is amazing, no?
Hamilton wiped the floor with Heikki, who was rated highly until joining McLaren.
Button did not fare nearly as well against Barrichello, he even got beat in 2008 by him, and half of 2009.
Button enjoyed a car advantage at the beginning of 2009 that Lewis never enjoyed in his Championship winning season or in 2007. Ferrari were always close, and his teammmate was also driving a McRon, a certain Alonso in 2007.
In 2009 I thought he pulled points out of thin air in a car that looked completely off the pace in Kovalainen's hands.

Basically, Hamilton is very very special, and I pity those that do not see it, or do not want to accept it. You are missing out. To me he really looks like the heir to Schumacher's crown, though Alonso is also very very good, and other drivers can also beat him, given the circumstances, like Vettel and Button and Kubica and Massa and perhaps even Webber and Rosberg on occasion (and of course Kimi, were he to come back). Hence Lewis won't have it easy, and I don't see him dominating like Schumacher once did, the field is just too good.

Furthermore, what matters to me is driving ability, everything else takes a distant second in my evaluations. I don't really care what Lewis says, what Button says, what their fathers say etc... If I wanted soap operas, I would watch them. I am not sure why it matters to anyone, unless they somehow delude themselves into believing that they get to know a sports star by reading their sound bites on the internet or in the papers. Utter and complete delusion.


Cheers,
Cooper

yea this

The beauty of this of course is that in a few months we will all find out and there will be nowhere to hide - and that goes for the Alonso/Massa & Schumi/everyone else discussions also.....

Fantastic post, well thought through and put across

Aki Hintsa highlighting one of Hamilton's strengths.

Fits with what we've seen doesn't it.

Be interesting to have LH vs JB data.

I hope hope hope I eat my words, but Lewis is going to trash Button.

well one thing is for sure the technical input will also come more from JB due to his experience and technically he is very good. I am not sure about hammy as alonso eluded at his time that hammys team looked a lot at his car set-up and data. Heikke also hinted that he sometimes was a test pig for hammy for car settings/tyres. So if hammy has a weakness that someone can exploit it maybe his technical ability?

Brilliant point and I believe Hamilton himself alluded to it in his season preview:

"We'll be sharing the pre-season testing equally, and it will be important to keep a crossover of information between us to make sure we are both pulling in the right direction."

What was the purpose of that sentence? A public demand for data sharing?

We all remember the first race in 2007 where Hamilton wasn't allowed to 'share' data (GB of course) and he failed miserably. I surely hope Jenson keeps every trick to himself.

so, and last (2009) season, Heikki gave all the data and his set up to Lewis, and Lewis made it better?
This theory don't work
Who brought (together with his engineers) the car back to top?

Wasn't Jenson strugggeling, as Rubens refused to share his data with him?

WTF are you on about ? 'Information sharing' has always hapened in F1 (especially during pre-season testing). I remember reading somwhere how during the 2009 pre-season testing, Ham, Kov and Pedro taked about how they phoned each-other to update each-other on what was going on during and after testing.

Do you honestly think that Ham would have more to loose if there was to be no sharing of information at Mclaren next season? Ham was at Mclaren when they started buiding the 25, while But only joined the team in the late days of development. Surely But has more to gain from data sharing within Mclaren.

I never said in my post Heikki gave ALL data i meant it was clear and admitted by heikki and clear at some races.

You saying hammy brought the car to the top himself? please it was a joint effect by all the team. the car developmenets were on hammys car first.

Your theory about JB and RB i am afraid you been reading to much internet stories. The data these days is clear by both teams rubens and button never said that.
Ross stated many times the data is clear for all.

BTW rubens is the best technically in F1, so any teammate be foolish not use the knowledge etc?

In his rookie year, you'd expect a driver to benefit from his experienced teammate. But it's been a long time since Lewis has had a setup problem. Jense had some setup problems last year though, supposedly he relied on Rubens a lot, I don't think he's technical at all. Mark Slade will be a big improvement for him over Shov though I think.

But in any case they use quite different setups, I don't know they'll use much from each other.

yes in silverstone he didn't use alonsos team data as he was "comfortable with this race pace on the tyres" but alonso knew the balance changes on the tyres as the key to laptime is stability in high speed corners, and set his car up to cater for this. And in the race your right he lost a lot of time when his tyres grip was lost and he got a lot of oversteer. Alonso had his car set-up with a bit of understeer so when the rears went of he get a bit neutral balance.

i agree shovlin didn't help jenson if you read his book without blaming any one he knew the reasons for set-up issues and reading between the lines it seems some issues were due to his style of not being able to create tyre temp and making big compromises with camber/suspension etc etc which made the car difficult in qualy.

the mistake he admits was his was in valencia when he accidently shifted to early costing him tenths -call it tightening up etc on the final lap for qualy etc

Ross Brawn might take issue with that.

"Rubens is very good at feeling through what the car is doing and looking at the second level of analysis. When we did front wing comparisons he was sensitive and able to analyse them, a little more so than Jenson, who is more like Michael and tends to cope with whats there. Rubens has always been technically astute and, with no testing, that helped."

Alonso had the A-team working on his car in 2007 so it's only natural that the B-team look to what the other team are doing to help the team in the constructors championship. It's the way a team sport works. Sure Lewis had a weakness in 2007, his lack of experience in setting up an F1 car might have been one of them, but he's been setting up McLarens for three years now and winning races doing so, some of them in dominant style like Silverstone 2008, Nurburgring 2008 and he was avital part of the teamwork that turned things around on the Mp4-24 in an almost unprecedented manner last year. I'd be wary of writing off Lewis in any respect with the experiences he'd picked up over the last three years.

data sharing is key to making any team move forward...there are so many things to test in test days or gp weekends that you need both drivers to do it.

Hamilton's inexperience relative to 2*WDC Alonso in car setup in his first year in F1 is pretty much irrelevant right now....

Of course he failed miserably. That race was preceded by a four day test that he was locked out of. Alonso had four days to get the car sorted, plus practice iirc. Hamilton had three hours.

I remember Heikki tested the new front wing in Bahrain and he didn't feel it an improvement. Lewis already used that one in China, Heikki didn't for the same reason, he didn't feel it an improvement (though, CFD, wind tunnel data and Lewis said it's an improvement to the former). The team asked Lewis on a Bahrain friday practice, to test the old wing to set the final conclusion, Lewis tried it and after a lap said on the radio it is crap, team asked him to change the flap, still crap (compared to the new one). Then Lewis went into the pit, to throw away the old wing from the car and concentrate on the more important tasks. After that both Lewis and Heikki used the new front wing.

So who was the better and more trusted test driver in this case? The incredible development of the 24 and the race wins (with Lewis) also shows Lewis is a good test driver, he has learned it very well in 3 years how to set up his car.

Jenson has admitted in 2009, he used Rubens' set-up for some races, because didn't find a good one. Even in 2007 it was said there were races where Alonso ran very little on friday to spare the car more, as he knew the tracks well. On such weekends Lewis was the driver who made the baseline set-up, then the data was shared for Alonso and both guys polished it further for the qualy.

In 2007 Alonso was a more experienced driver, no doubt about that he was the better one with set-up, but Lewis wasn't lame either, and he said last year he learned from Alonso in that year. After 3 years of continuous learning and working in F1 Lewis undoubtedly was learning and experiencing a lot, so he is a complete driver already capable of testing and set-up work.

What he mentions in that interview it's all about development, to develop into the right direction to exhaust the most performance from the car. The team is considered a whole, looks all the data coming from all of their drivers as a whole. The team need all the data, drivers have to discuss their impressions with the car openly, hiding things hinders the development of the car, so it's would be a negative effect for both drivers via the car.

The race was preceded by........the previous race in France.

Maybe you're referring to the 3 day Silverstone test after USA, in which Alonso tested a single day. Facts can be checked through pitpass if you don't believe me

Lewis was just exposed that weekend. He needed the sharing. Which is why he's crying out for Jenson's help already

Well, Kova is indeed hinting at "something" going on in his McLaren years that created the false impression he would struggle in the races:

"No. I think I know the reasons why the races were not good enough - nearly 100 per cent, perhaps 95 per cent. But I don't want to get into it that much."

"I think it might have looked like that from the outside, but I know what was going on and what the reasons were. That is all I need to know.

"People will have this kind of theory and I need to show that it is not a problem, and that is probably the main focus this year. To make sure that the race pace is like it should be, and it shows on the paper - rather than what is going on in the background."

My guess is that he hints at the fuel loads, he was getting the short end of the stick 9 out of 10 times. Technically he may be right, but OTOH had McLaren strictly altered the best strategy between him and Hamilton that might well have cost them the 2008 title, in exchange for maybe 6 to 10 more points for their 2nd driver. So he can't seriously blame the team, the main issue remains that he never looked like being able to rise to Hamiltons level and consequently he slipped into the support driver role. Not nice, but F1 isn't nice by definition.

You know what I meant. The Silverstone race was preceded by a test session at the circuit where Alonso got the ball rolling while Hamilton was totally sidelined. The fact that there was another race in between the Silverstone test and the race is immaterial. Alonso rtook over from de la Rosa to finalise the baseline setup for Silverstone and then, if you believe the reports, hid his setup from Hamilton so that he had to start from scratch.

Apologies for my error, I was going from memory. Not a clever thing to do when you get to my age... It was the four day test at Barcelona that Hamilton was also locked out of.

We only get to see visual changes to cars so maybe Heikki had other things on his car which were not the same as hammys? as it would be a BIG BIG push to make 2 cars the same and increase the development effort to claw back over 1 second of time in the season

Whether we *really* know a driver or not isn't all that important. We still get to see glimpses of these driver's personalities here and there, and it follows by human nature that we start to make some sort of judgement about them. If we're put off by a certain driver, we have every right in the world to not want to support them. And if driver ability alone is all we use to 'judge' drivers, then by your logic, everybody who watched F1 at anytime from 1994 through 2006 should have been Schumacher fans by default. Sounds kinda lame to me.

Its a bit stupid for people to deny Lewis' talent, I agree, but we certainly dont have to like the guy, whatsoever. Even as a Ferrari fan, I was never necessarily a Schumacher fan, even if I did enjoy seeing *a* red car doing well.

Who we support and why we support them is our own business. We certainly dont need other people telling us who we should be supporting or the reasons we should be supporting someone(I'm not implying you're doing that, but you're certainly trying to make a *case* for what you think is a good guideline).

That was nothing out of the ordinary I'm afraid. At the very next test after Silverstone, McLaren fielded PDLR 2 days and Hamilton for 1. While Alonso was totally sidelined.

Your claims of "collusion" are defamatory unless there is indeed some proofs.

Thank you, you have examplified it really good
i have not the vocabluary and the specialised knowledge
to discribe what I think about this case

But if one Team makes such a complete turnaround during one season,
without testdriving, anything must go very well together
it won't have happened with a driver with a lack of technical abillity.

I'm not disputing that it was out of the ordinary, just that Hamilton's setup time at Silverstone was hampered by a) him not being present for the test and b) that Alonso who was present at the test is reported to have sandbagged on the setup. With Hamilton in his first year it's no surprise he looked out of shape there. I have no problem with the testing schedules imposed by McLaren, only with those that use Hamilton for lampooning over his struggles at Silverstone unaware that Alonso had far more seat time at the track than Lewis did.

Collusion? Edited that out as there is no proof. Other than Stepneygate.


btw, the next race at a circuit where they were to race at was at Spa on July 10th - Hamilton did the first day, Alonso did the following two. There was a test at a non-race circuit at Jerez before the Spa test which you referred to, but on track time setting up the car for a specific circuit will be more advantageous for the driver that does participate than one that doesn't, or has tested for one day at a non-race circuit where setups will be more or less useless for coming races unless the configuration, track surface and ambient conditions are very similar. It was noteworthy that most of Hamilton's testing was done at non-race circuits such as Paul Ricard and Jerez while all of Alonso's was done at race circuits. As such, in my opinion, Alonso had a head start come Friday practice and the difference between the two was at its greatest following test sessions at race circuits. Silverstone, Spa & Monza, where they did a day and half each with Hamilton doing the initial baseline work. Elsewhere they were more evenly matched.

Sandbag? You realise Alonso had the 2nd fastest time of the whole test?

Hamilton's innexperience allowed him to lead the WDC and win 2 unknown races shortly before Silverstone.

Why the sudden change? You say Alonso "had more seat time"; I say the one day of testing was not THAT significant. Remember the Malaysia test that year? Hamilton had 2 days, Alonso NONE. Remind me who won the race?

Lewis better step up his game in 2010 because Jenson won't need half a season to prevent his hard earned skills being "shared". The exposing will come

@ timba:


i'm afraid that you will be left scrambling for excuses once the season gets underway. i highly doubt Jenson is the all knowing set-up genie that you seem to be trying very hard convince yourself that he is....

Actually Alonso had third fastest time of the final day 21st June 2007 - Go check. Beaten by Massa's Ferrari and Rosberg's Williams.

Sure a whole day's running is significant, the troubles experienced by Ferrari's stand-ins this year highlight how important track time can be. One day of a test can involve a full race distance and more. Every little helps. Though there are instances when it doesn't work such as the four day Barcelona test in 2007 that Hamilton again sat out but was quicker than Alonso in 4 of the 6 timed pre-race sessions, and one of the other two only fell to Alonso becuase he was three laps lighter than Hamilton in Q3. Remind me who finished ahead of who in the race?

If Lewis does step up his game for 2010 I fear Button mightn't know what hit him come season's end.....

Lewis is a master of McLaren cars already because of the 3 years working with McLaren cars, Jenson said he needs to learn many things which is new to him, car included. Jenson needs shared data from Lewis more than vice versa. And he'll get it, a driver can't hide his set-up data from others in the team because his race engineer and many other assistant engineers will know it too. Also e.g. the guys at the Mission Control room at Woking know the set-up of both cars, to get good conclusions, to make good decision relating development, set-up and race strategy etc., they must know the data from both cars. A driver which hiding things, is against his own intersts also. So no hiding possible. You as a driver can only hide that set-up which you won't use either and state it to crap (but even then the engineers can find out from the data you're lying), so you can't hide what you want to use or what you want to hide that cannot be used and stated and showed (by the car) to a good set-up.

So who set up Lewis's car when he won the championship
Or who helped improve the car as much as it did this year perhaps you think Alonso lent Lewis his mythical 0.6 seconds
You seam to want to ignore it was Lewis's first year in F1 and of course just like any other driver Alonso included they would take set-ups from the more experienced driver after all in your first year in F1 how are you expected to know how an F1 car performs when set up well on each track when you have never driven an F1 car on that track and perhaps have not even driven the track before.

Please do not let this thread become anther Lewis v Alonso argument. The thread is Lewis vs Jenson

Lewis vs Jenson will be a really good fight I reckon.

They're very similar people.

Both nice guys, both good looking, both with beautiful girlfriends and (related to F1) both fantastically quick.

I'd always thought Lewis the one of the strongest overtakers in F1 but I think Jenson got close in 2009.

I guess the test will be the strength of the car. Lewis seems able to drive around problems better than Jenson.

Then again, if the car is totally sorted Jenson will be so strong.

Definately will,not that I support either in particular