"believe" "guess". It´s not worth to discuss about speculations without knowledge and credible sources, that´s all. No matter if you or I´m wrong.

LOL so, to post here I need to look for credible proof residing in articles on the internet? haha, dude, not only is that not correct as everyone is entitled to post their OPINIONS here, but also, it's quite naive. I'm sure everything you write or discuss is backed up by an internet article? give me a break. lets play that game, find me a credible source or article that says he DIDN"T make the call as a fact.

I'll make a note of that. Thanks for the tip.

You brought Malaysia 09 up in this thread, not me Mr.
It was your "guess" that he made the call and I said give me a source that proves your opinion. You couldn´t.

LOL I never said I couldn't, it was more like I wouldn't lol big difference, one means I tried and failed, the other means I don't care and won't go through the hassle just to beat you in a silly conversation

Like I said, I don't care, so, if you'd really feel better, I can be the bigger man and concede, just, say the words

Just say, "Birelman, you suck, and I think you're the worst poster ever and you don't know Jack about F1 and I want you to concede because you have no proof that Schumacher is meaner than Darth Vader and he did that to poor Raikkonen, which Schumacher loved with all his heart and worked really hard to help beat Massa during his time at Ferrari!" just say that

Ah ok, you could but you´re not interested in? That´s why we discuss here since ~40 minutes because you "don´t care"?. A source from your side and the discussion would have been 38 minutes shorter

Yea, really, I'd rather just keep clicking reply on your posts than go look for information which really, is not going to make my pipi any larger

That sums it up, indeed.

NORBERT HAUG
“Nico and our team did the maximum they could and achieved the best possible result for us today. Sixth place on the dirty side of the track with less grip is not the ideal place for a good start, but our result could have been worse after we faced some problems in finding the right set-up direction for the cars yesterday. Well done to the team for the recovery. Michael tried a different set-up solution which did not work out in the end. A week at Hockenheim, he was eight-thousands of a second slower than Nico and here the margin is much bigger so we just did not get it right.”

Could it be that Nico was superior? I dont get why Norbert has to give these statements after every qualy/race.To me it undermines Rosbergs performances.

To be fair I dot think he is trying to do that. He is merely trying to boost M Schumacher although the excuses and justifications are becoming increasingly difficult for the Mercedes pr department. Nobby is doing his best...bless him.

The spectacle has become better in 2010? No, it hasn´t! If there is no rain or changeable conditions, the races are absolutely boring. Formula One in 2010 is about having a good position after qualifying, a good start the day after and then a look after your tyres. That´s all! Overtaking is nearly impossible, in most cases your car has to be much (!) faster for it or the man in front of you has to make a mistake. Yeah, there are still some overtakes, but we saw them even in times of refueling. Sometimes more, Sometimes less, like in the past, but all in all the show doesn´t become better.

I had expected much more, after hearing about the new regulations.



Yes, he said, that he can´t understand, why there is no testing in today´s Formula One. But he also said, that unlimited testing is not the solution. because of economic and the environmental effect.



Schumacher was good at his some races in 1991 and in the seasons of 1992 & 1993, when there was even no refueling. Well, different cars, different tyres than today, but generally you can´t say: "Michael isn`t good, because there is no refueling".

Michael Schumacher was 3 years away from professional motorsport, a very long time and he isn´t getting younger. It was a completely new Formula One for him. New regs, New tyres, no testing during the season and a car which he doesn´t favour - Not the greatest basis for a comeback after a long break! Well, i don´t think, that he´s a stupid guy. He wouldn´t have start a comeback, if he has any doubts about things, like no refueling or testing and so on. He is still fighting for Project 8 and i hope he will become success. He had a three years contract with Mercedes, next year he´s definitely in the grid. Possibly we are going to see another Michael Schumacher in 2011. I hope so.

Good luck, Michael!!!

1. There are 5 drivers that genuinely have a shot of winning the championship with over half the season gone.
2. There is no way of knowing who is going to win any given weekend (compared to past seasons when unless it was a mixed up race you knew it would be either MS or MH, or KR of FA, or who ever the two stand out drivers for any given season where)
3. The midfield is a complete mix, with some of the cars even outperforming some of the championship challengers almost every weekend.

I admit a lot of this comes from the sport becoming a bit artificial with engine equalization (The FIA can call it whatever it wants, equalization is what it has really tried to do), and the two tyre rule etc, but its a heck of a lot better than most years from the 90's and the last decade.

Any prove for that? Nico being faster than Michael kills your theory.
man, you were there when they set up both car? If they say both cars were set up differently then it is true? Any better source?

Does it?

I guess with Nico 50-something points ahead it's a valid point to contend that Michael may have become the testing bitch for the team. And why not?

No, we havent noticed that, simply because that is not true. Rosberg is far better and far faster, most of the time.


This is really enjoyable to see schumacher struggle like that, I hope he continues for 3 more years at least, because this is really fun for me to watch.

That´s the whole issue, as LdM has already pointed out: this season we are no seeing MS, but his twin brother driving. Do you really think that the real MS is driving again in 2011?

There is absolutely nowhere for Schumacher to hide. There is no excuse for the ridiculous beating he's taking, short of being a lil too old, a lil too rusty, a lil past his time. All this talk of getting ready for 2011 has one very massive flaw in it. If the 2011 car suits Michael more, Rosberg will STILL be faster than him in it! How the Schumacher sycophants fail to acknowledge this is beyond me... Accept it guys, Schumacher is done. When they changed the wheelbase of the car way back in barcelona for Michael, Rosberg proceeded to trounce him even more.

First it was "Give him 3 races"

Then it was "Give him till Monaco"

Then it was give him till the middle of the season.

Now its give him till next year. How about we give him another 5 seasons? I simply can't see a washed up Schumacher competing against the Hamiltons,Alonsos, Vettels or Kubicas of this world. Not unless he has a car ridiculously faster than anyone elses, and even if that happens, Nico will lead him home left, right and center. It's embarrassing frankly. He's effectively been reduced to Coulthard status, which is a new low for Michael.

"This is MY year" Michael Schumacher, February 2011.

Do we(fans) have to show that we care what you think? Don't think so. To listen you or Ross and Haug. Another tough one. Just kidding again.

MS drive well till Turkey. Ha beat Nico in Barcelona, in Monaco and in Turkey too. In Montreal & Valencia the qualy was bad, but the starst were excellent, and in both race ha could beat Nico if the tactics were net so stupid. Hockenheim was also close.

Will be not nice if Michael overtake Nico in the first lap again.

Recall when they debuted a car with different wheelbase just to make MS quicker, and that was the only weekend when Schumacher was quicker than Nico in qualifying, too. But then they realized that although they had sabotaged Nico and helped Schumy, their overall positions with respect to competition hadn't improved.

So they went back to older spec next race. I have not kept track since, and do not know what these clowns are doing right now in their desperate attempts to make the slower driver quicker, all the while ignoring the one driver who can win races for them.


He's faster inspite of Mercedes' best / worst attempts. Read their PR quotes since the start of the season, it is all about making a car which will 'suit Schumacher'. It is a neverending quest because they have convinced themselves that their is something wrong with their car, so rather than focusing on Rosberg's feedback they keep trying new solutions and increasingly farcial race strategies to make Schumacher get better results.

Unfortunately the problem is not with the car, but his team-mate: Nico does not "suit" Michael.

They bring longer wheelbase to get bigger window for set ups and to change car balance and WD. Yes, Nico didn't need that too. This doesn't help him too. Yes and he say this is good what they did. And with shorter wheelbase Michael "beat" him in Monaco.

Out of Spain, Monaco and Turkey, MS was only truly faster in race pace than Nico in Barcelona. The bad luck tends to even out over a full season between 2 drivers. The reason all these negative things keep happening to MS is because he's just too slow, thus making the team resort to marginal strategies to get any results. The differential between the two is fluctuating from MS being badly beaten to him being almost equal to Nico. These 3-4 tenths he's losing on average are simply gone and I fail to see how he's ever going to get them back this year, next year, any year with the testing limits in place.

If Schumacher was really suffering that much with equal conditions and efforts compared to Nico, he would have left the sport already with any fabricated excuse, neck injury? prostate cancer (He's old enough), whatever

I have to/am willing to/want to believe he is taking this season to learn about the new machines he is racing, testing new things for this year and next.

Next year they will have a new car with completely new tyres. Most of the tracks he already knows. What is it that he would be testing that would be relevant?

Well, I guess apologies to Petrov are in order, for comparing him with Schumacher.

Differentials rear wings, gearboxes, suspension setups, diffusers, kers ballast. All these things are important for next season.

No

You mean like in other cases where you have F1 champions doing well one weekend and being hopeless the next? Like Hamilton and Button last season. When you've got a situation within a team whereby one driver excels when the car/tyre is in a narrow performance window (BGP 001) and is beaten by his teammate simply because the track was too cold/warm,you know something's really wrong with the sport.



Ah yes,the usual bitching,you guys never cease to amaze me. Let's take a random example: Ferrari's current no.1 driver-Alonso-is also,IMO,an overrated driver that's never been any good to begin with. His entire career has been a farce,with people like Briatore willing to do anything to help him win,as was indeed exposed with Singaporegate and last Sunday's debacle. Never been in a title fight with anything other than the best cars,and the only time he's had a quality teammate he got his butt kicked. So then-crappy driver that doesn't belong in F1. (remember I'm only using your nonsense theory here) Accept this and I'll acknowledge some of you aren't hypocrites.



Spoken like a true 7-time world F1 champion,not some random nerd on the internet! (oh wait..)

These tyre issues are a consequence of being a guy that hasn't raced in three years-slicks or grooves-unlike his teammate who has had all of 2009 to work on his problems.



You really have trouble separating opinions from facts,don't you? Here's a pointer: try not to force opinions on others and state them like they were facts,only sounds rather pompous.

I think it should be rather obvious I meant MS' own era when I said old school: he's the only remnant of the era of the 90s and noughties on the current grid. We're in the M.Schumacher thread-not the Nostalgia forum-so I don't see the point to discussing ancient history on here..? As for the rest I can't compare racing to athletics-having raced quite a bit myself-so into the garbage bin it goes.

please tell me schumacher didnt start on softs and that he wont be pitting in a few laps time even though the soft is rumoured to last half distance

So much for the car being set up for the race. His race pace is nothing to shout about and he was overtaken by Kobayashi. I must confess now that I've lost all hope that he can compete with Nico even next year.

hearly every lap ive seen when ive glanced at the live timings has always been faster than button though so it could be worse.

button got lucky at the pitstops, god knows what happened with koybayashi i dont think they showed it on the tv.

even if schumacher was 1second faster than everyone else he wouldnt be able to overtake anyway because the merc has such a crap straight line speed

Yeah, because we have such a good comparison with Rosberg at the moment...
Rosberg had a train behind him and he lost 2 sec/lap in the first stint.

Well, during the time Nico was racing, he was quicker than MS, but MS was in traffic, Nico had clean air, so possibly not a fair comparison.

Exactly, so why making that comment if we can´t compare the two today?

We see this every race, as the fuel burns down and car gets lighter, MS' pace drops alarmingly. He might be passed by Reubens.

yea im sure its nothing to do with how early hes pitted every race....

do you think mercedes have miracle tyres or something pretty much every race hes ended up on crap tyres at the end that are completly worn away

There is a thread for the barrichello move, please use it.

http://forums.autosport.com/index.php?showtopic=133830

He pitted at the same time as almost everyone else today.

when did barrichello pit?

Compared to other cars he was still slow, even compared to those who pitted at the same time. Do you really believe Saubers or Williamses were quicker cars than the Mercedes? Yet, Schumacher finished far behind those.

I find it embarassing that MS finished out of points with Lewis, Robert, Adrian and Nico out of race.

Remember when James Hunt used to say how it was never a great loss when the likes of Arnoux, Grouillard, and Alliot used to retire from races "no big loss to the race. The rest of the drivers will be releived that a major hazard is out of the way." The same applies for M Schumacher. Outclassed, out fought, a mobile chicane merely disrupting racing for others while being terribly slow at the same time. :-)

Maybe you forgot to look at the other drivers.

The only one that did great was Koba.

What I mean is that with these 4 drivers out MS should have no problems with gathering points.

Its not even fun bashing the CGB when he is so pathetic. He must really be selling lots of Benzes

Where exactly has all the speed gone, though? Is it simply just an age thing, or what?

It's well past the point whereby Michael could still claim to be getting used to a very different formula vis-a-vis the one he last raced in. I struggle to imagine where the improvement is going to come from on his side. He's not suddenly going to be half a second quicker in 2011.

Given his typical starting position, the penalty means that he may be starting 25th out of what, 24 cars? LOL

Where exactly has all the speed gone, though? Is it simply just an age thing, or what?

Beeing out of the sport for three years doesn't help but I believe Schumacher was so successful because he could test endlessly and get the car to suit him perfectly and having a teammate who had to adapt to his car preferences and not beeing able to compete with him on an equal base.

Also having Todt, Brawn and Byrne in Ferrari along with the biggest budget in the sport doesn't hurt. The guy was always a good driver but not necessarely faster than some of his main competitors during his golden era.

I think we are seeing his true potential in this era of F1, with him perhaps losing a little bit of the speed he once had.

A possible eight title? Not in a million years.

Beating Rosberg next year? Highly unlikely (unless he gets a car that doesn't suit Rosberg at all).

Winning a race in F1 again? Perhaps.

Retiring after this season? Hopefully!