Team-mate battles of 2013

[A FONDO]

I will continue to follow the outcome of Lotus's and Mclaren's team battles. Will the eager guys beat the conservative dinosaurs?
Others are either already decided or out of interest.

[henners88]

Hamilton v Rosberg – Obviously they are closer than the points indicate as Nico has had a fair amount of sheer unluck. A points deficit, which is difficult to overcome, but percentage-wise Nico has plenty of room for improvement. Interesting that Hamilton has had an identical start to the season Rosberg himself had in 2010 (2x3rd and 2x5th) – can Mercedes keep it up this time?

I totally agree with what you are saying here but can't help but think back to your recent comments about Hamilton's misfortune in 2012. He experienced so much bad luck it brought Button well within reach in the points, to which many justified it as meaning they were very close in ability across that season. At the end of the day we can see Rosberg is very talented and IMHO will run Hamilton closer than Button ever did. This all comes down to luck though. If either driver runs into bad luck over multiple races where the other doesn't, do we still claim the one with the good luck ran the other close? If Rosberg consistently out qualifies Hamilton and retires from positions ahead of him in the race, therefore meaning Lewis remains close in terms of points, I will happily say Rosberg performed better by the end of the season. It all comes down to how forgiving we can be when excusing bad luck.

[AndyL]

I totally agree with what you are saying here but can't help but think back to your recent comments about Hamilton's misfortune in 2012. He experienced so much bad luck it brought Button well within reach in the points, to which many justified it as meaning they were very close in ability across that season. At the end of the day we can see Rosberg is very talented and IMHO will run Hamilton closer than Button ever did. This all comes down to luck though. If either driver runs into bad luck over multiple races where the other doesn't, do we still claim the one with the good luck ran the other close? If Rosberg consistently out qualifies Hamilton and retires from positions ahead of him in the race, therefore meaning Lewis remains close in terms of points, I will happily say Rosberg performed better by the end of the season. It all comes down to how forgiving we can be when excusing bad luck.

Hopefully they will remain team-mates for 3 years or so, so that things have time to even out and we can read a long-term trend. Seems likely given that they are friends and it's hard to see an ambitious team wanting to get rid of either. I'd predict similar to what we saw at McLaren, Hamilton by a narrow margin.

[henners88]

Hopefully they will remain team-mates for 3 years or so, so that things have time to even out and we can read a long-term trend. Seems likely given that they are friends and it's hard to see an ambitious team wanting to get rid of either. I'd predict similar to what we saw at McLaren, Hamilton by a narrow margin.

I think the same but hopefully it'll be narrow where both drivers can be compared with points telling the true story over the period, if you know what I mean. I'd rather the comparison be between two drivers closely matched in ability rather than what we had at McLaren. I think Rosberg is capable of running Hamilton close on pure performance.

[msratings]

Pretty much spot on there....I cant really see any of the current inter-team battles changing in the next few races. Would be nice to see the rookies make ground as they get more used to F1. Some of the drivers could do with having same packages as their team mates as well as Grosjean and Van Der Garde have both missed out so far. Though Grosjean did get new chassis for Bahrain

[Knock-on]

Im not sure. Nico is no mug and anyone that embarrasses Schumacher each year is obviously a top driver. However, i predict the points gap will finish with Nico on 75% or less than Lewis

[faster69]

he hardly embarrassed schumacher. they were pretty much even in 2012 (slight edge to schumacher i think) if you look at qualifying head to head and the head to head for races finished. schumacher had horrendous reliability last season.

hamilton is in his peak years right now and is paid by mercedes to get a pole position like nico did.

[Knock-on]

he hardly embarrassed schumacher. they were pretty much even in 2012 (slight edge to schumacher i think) if you look at qualifying head to head and the head to head for races finished. schumacher had horrendous reliability last season.

hamilton is in his peak years right now and is paid by mercedes to get a pole position like nico did.

Look, you might dream with technicolour glasses on but I live in the real world. I am basing my statement on 36 months of race results. We are not going back nd examining each individual race over 3 years but the points at the end of the year. If not, you will need to look back at the entire Schumacher record and where he was supported by his tem mate or they 'moved aside', where he had preferential treatment, where his team mates broke down but he has amazing reliability (sound like Red Bull ), had illegal equipment, crshed into competitos to win Championships etc, etc, etc.

Points over a 3 year period are enough and a 7 times champion who according to some people could take a Minardi and win the Championship was beaten in 3 consecutive years. The record stands:

2012 - 93 points to 49
2011 - 89 points to 76
2010 - 142 points to 72

This was the first time in a long time that Schumy was on an even playing field in a team and The Messiah got thrashed by someone I consider to be a fast but not exceptional driver.

To a 7 Times WDC, that's embarrassing.

[Knock-on]

he hardly embarrassed schumacher. they were pretty much even in 2012 (slight edge to schumacher i think) if you look at qualifying head to head and the head to head for races finished. schumacher had horrendous reliability last season.

hamilton is in his peak years right now and is paid by mercedes to get a pole position like nico did.

Look, you might dream with technicolour glasses on but I live in the real world. I am basing my statement on 36 months of race results. We are not going back nd examining each individual race over 3 years but the points at the end of the year. If not, you will need to look back at the entire Schumacher record and where he was supported by his tem mate or they 'moved aside', where he had preferential treatment, where his team mates broke down but he has amazing reliability (sound like Red Bull ), had illegal equipment, crshed into competitos to win Championships etc, etc, etc.

Points over a 3 year period are enough and a 7 times champion who according to some people could take a Minardi and win the Championship was beaten in 3 consecutive years. The record stands:

2012 - 93 points to 49
2011 - 89 points to 76
2010 - 142 points to 72

This was the first time in a long time that Schumy was on an even playing field in a team and The Messiah got thrashed by someone I consider to be a fast but not exceptional driver.

To a 7 Times WDC, that's embarrassing.

[i_max2k2]

Look, you might dream with technicolour glasses on but I live in the real world. I am basing my statement on 36 months of race results. We are not going back nd examining each individual race over 3 years but the points at the end of the year. If not, you will need to look back at the entire Schumacher record and where he was supported by his tem mate or they 'moved aside', where he had preferential treatment, where his team mates broke down but he has amazing reliability (sound like Red Bull ), had illegal equipment, crshed into competitos to win Championships etc, etc, etc.

Points over a 3 year period are enough and a 7 times champion who according to some people could take a Minardi and win the Championship was beaten in 3 consecutive years. The record stands:

2012 - 93 points to 49
2011 - 89 points to 76
2010 - 142 points to 72

This was the first time in a long time that Schumy was on an even playing field in a team and The Messiah got thrashed by someone I consider to be a fast but not exceptional driver.

To a 7 Times WDC, that's embarrassing.

Obviously you're also wearing some technicolor glasses with the way you paint Schumacher. In all fairness, at the end we all realized Schumacher was past his prime. The lack of reliability from Mercedes and/or incidents in a race hurt his chances more then anything else did. To me a fair comparison would be how they performed in a race when both had a incident free and reliable race, that of course happens less, but I'm sure most would agree with me, that Schumacher overall was comparable with Nico over the last 2yrs for sure.

And for his performances in his peek i.e. 2006 and before you can read some Facts here -

How Great Was Michael Schumacher? ~ F1 Revs

To give an idea of Michael Schumacher's incredible talent, in the 10 years from his first full season in 1992 to the end of the 2001 season before qualifying went into idiotic format, the average difference between him and his teammate was a massive 1.090s. The head to head qualifying battle between him and the only other person in the same car was a ridiculous 150-8 hammering over that same 10 year period. Schumacher's average grid spot was 2.7, his teammates 7.5.

To give the stats some more context, Schumacher out-qualified every team-mate he had at every grand prix from the end of the 1991 season until the start of the 1996 season, with the exception of the 1995 Belgian GP when it started to rain and Schumacher hadn’t set a lap in the dry. Incidentally that weekend he qualified 15th and still went on to win the race in typically spectacular Spa wet weather driving fashion.

From Schumacher's first full season in 1992 to his first retirement in 2006 his race head to head with teammates was a staggering 113-23 in races both finished. Average finish position for Schumacher was 2.5 and for his teammates 5.2 over that same 15 year period.

For some more facts here is his final tally - 91 GP wins, 7 WDC's and 68 pole positions, the last part is just so you can see some REAL numbers