planetf1.com

From media to overall fans our view on Hamilton getting to Merc devastated Rosberg's glamor. Are we rushing? - Could we be totally wrong?

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I've not underestimated him. It will be close between the two

I suppose it depends on how we all rate Nico Rosberg.

I think they will be reasonably close.

His lead in China was astounding though... Or maybe Raikkonen was just holding everybody up. Whatever, 54 days left

I can't tell! I honestly can say I have no clue whether or not he is underestimated.

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Don't be quick to judge or the verdict might come back to you.

Don't really know what Rosberg holds and next year will show us the calibre of his driving.

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Vodafone Mclaren Mercedes

Overall, Rosberg is seriously underrated. A great majority of fans have no reference points apart from team mate comparisons, and are unable to gauge the relative merits of any driver compared to their peers in other teams. The only other tool available for them is history, and the inaccurate and foolish "A>B in 2007, B>C in 2002, C>D in 2010, and thus A>D in 2013" kind of logic. They seem to forget or ignore the fact that drivers can improve or degrade over the years.

And of course there are the loud and vocal Hamilton fans who perpetually state that Hamilton will "crush" or "destroy", or "eviscerate" anyone who competes against their hero. So they are making exactly the same noise against Rosberg that they did with Button, and as history has shown, Button more than held his ground.

People will compare Rosberg to Hamilton for the next year, and if Rosberg does manage to best him, legions of loyal and loud Hamilton fans will swamp forums with every excuse and conspiracy theory to prove that it wasn't Rosberg that bested Hamilton, but rather one of a long list of excuses from team principle bias to Twitter malfunction to alien abduction.

Adding an entire layer on top of the manure heap is the tendency to predict or speculate to the extremes, where is has developed from careful analysis to wild statements, and somehow many people treat them with the same validity.

People change, drivers change, circumstances change. We all witnessed how Hamilton improved from 2011 to 2012, or how Fisichella went from being a star in Force India to a shadow of himself in Ferrari.

For the last three years Rosberg held his own against an aging, but still dangerously formidable racer in the form of Michael Schumacher. Personally, I don't see any major flaws in Rosberg or reason not to believe he's a very good racer.

Rosberg would've had a decent chance to win the WDC if he were driving for Red Bull.

Careful blinky... you do not want to upset ones who are already off their rocker

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My Top 5 drivers of all times:
1) Prost/ Schumacher
3) Fangio
4) Lauda
5) Brabham

if you don't like it, too bad! There's a reason why it says "My Top 5"

Humiliate is unfairly wording the choice, as Lewis and NR are such good friends.
This kind of driver lineup is rare in F1, I believe. JMO, but their friendship main reason why Lewis left Mac, NR would be teammate? That, and the trophies???

I believe Lewis will 'Alonso' the Mercedes to the front on a regular basis, regardless of track.

NR has not shown that ability, as he goes away at times.
Of course, that could be due to the dog of a car they were driving these last three years.

I do not believe Mercedes will build a championship car until 2014; even then, fingers crossed for them.

If the 2013 car is near equal to the RB9 and Mac, Lewis & NR could contend for the championship.

Lewis could double NR in points if the 2013 car is a dog.

But he would not do that to humiliate him.

I do rate NR highly, just not near Lewis, Alonso, Seb or Kimi.

Because the ravings of a few fanboys (who exist for any driver) is obviously representative of a whole fanbase...

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"Where are all the good men dead, in the heart or in the head?"

Give 'em hell Dani!

British Driver Supporter (and Daniel Ricciardo)

Nico got beaten only 12-6 in qualifying by Webber in his rookie year, similar margin in the races, and it was appropriate that they crashed into each other in the final race in Brazil. It was a very good rookie year.

2007-2009 he thrashed all his teammates, even though some have said they weren't the best, if you thrash them people will say that.

2010 he trounced Schumacher. Clearly Schumacher wasn't where he used to be. 2011 Schumi got very close to Nico, but was probably sill fractionally behind (if he hadn't had so many DNF's he probably would have beaten Nico in the championship, but I still think Nico had a slight edge on speed). 2012 I think Schumi brought it slightly more often than Nico in an inconsistent car.

A couple of times Martin Brundle said he thought Schumi in 2012 was driving as well as ever (Germany and India he said that IIRC). I think he was possibly getting close to the level he was at in 2006. That would make Rosberg a very good driver.

Still Hamilton is so fast, he is the closest thing to peak Schumi IMO.

You're kidding?! Drivers can actually improve/degrade? Where will all the 2007 'Hamilton destroyed Alonso' fanboys go after learning that little doozy?

Also - this thread is pure speculation obviously. Just wait till Australia. This is the first time Nico will go up against a known quantity (beyond his rookie year...), so we can make our assessments then.

After Hamilton's first 3 seasons in F1 i think many believed he would beat Button easily but Button proved to be a worthy teammate beating Hamilton deservedly in 2011, i think the part of the problem in the thinking of teammates being crushed was because Kovalainen was so poor during his 2 seasons at McLaren, qualifying apart.

So i think Hamilton should beat Rosberg and certainly not destroy him provided he doesn't have the nonesense of a season he had in 2012 which is no guarantee seeing what a shambles Mercedes were last season.

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PFI Pick 10 Competition

Current Standing: 16th

Is he Underestimated as a whole. Yes. A lot use his time at Merc as a yardstick. Forgetting that when the Merc was up for it he got podiums and even a win. When it wasn't for the most part and especially in 2012 he was driving to a time to preserve tyres.

As for next year who knows. If Merc hasn't sorted their Woes I would say the pendulum will swing in Rosbergs favour. If they have Hammy will probably edge it but I would say it will be tighter than many expect. I would also think the quali stats won't be the same as teh Button/Hammy comparison.

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Disclaimer: The above post maybe tongue in cheek.

"I thought I'd get your theories, mock them, then embrace my own. The usual."

I just think there are better prospects out there, Nico was touted as a future star if he could get in the right team but what has he really done to earn that reputation? True his rookie season was impressive and he showed real talent but sine then he has beaten Wurz (just) who hadn't raced full time since 2000 and never really looked great, Nakajima who you didn't need to see destroyed to tell he wasn't F1 calibre, a seriouslyoff form Schumi. And this year aside from the win I would say Michael just got more out of the car. He was on pole at Monaco, not far behind Nico in China till someone messed his stop up and ran well in Australia. Nico had bad starts and was really annonymous from Monaco gone, yes the car was bad but he just made it look even worse. I think his boat has left harbour to be honest and Mercedes are better off looking elsewhere. (Preparing to be torn to shreds)

No the qualifying will be a battle, Rosberg is an excellent qualifier whilst Button has been the weakest qualifier out of all the teammates Hamilton has had

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PFI Pick 10 Competition

Current Standing: 16th

Not long ago Button was regarded as a good qualifier

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Disclaimer: The above post maybe tongue in cheek.

"I thought I'd get your theories, mock them, then embrace my own. The usual."

the only people who think that Hamilton will dominate Rosberg are to the same people who thought Hamilton would dominate Button, it is near impossible to dominate a competent team mate

Well i would say his rookie season wasn't really that impressive, perhaps Hamilton sets the benchmark there? Since then he has dome little wrong, dominated his teammates and was seemingly going to get destroyed by Schumacher but managed to come out on top. He seems to be in a no win situation with some were all the teammates he has been beaten are crap and he only beat Schumacher because he's an old man, he finally gets the chance to prove his worth and i expect him to do similarly as well as what Button did against Hamilton.

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PFI Pick 10 Competition

Current Standing: 16th

There's clearly other drivers on the grid that are better, thats not his best strength

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PFI Pick 10 Competition

Current Standing: 16th

We will kow is after this season

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"Everything you can imagine is real." Pablo Picasso

I just genuinely believe that if Rosberg were a truly elite talent, he would have beaten Schumacher convincingly over the last couple years. I don't include 2010 in that, since Schumacher was very poor and absolutely no competition whatsoever bar two or three decent drives.

Leaving the points from 2012 aside, since they were heavily skewed by Schumacher's early season misfortune, Rosberg has failed to convincingly beat a driver who was error prone, and sometimes (especially in 2011) lacking in one lap pace. Those are two major weaknesses that you won't find in the top drivers, including Hamilton, unless of course he endures a repeat of his 2011 season.

Just looking at some stats since the beginning of 2011...
Ahead when both finished: Schumacher 13-9 Rosberg (Admittedly, this is somewhat skewed by the fact that Rosberg was ahead of Schumacher in a fair few of the early 2012 races where MS had misfortune)
Ahead in quali: Rosberg 26-11 Schumacher (This stat excludes Spa and Suzuka 2011, and credits Schumacher with being ahead in Monaco 2012)
Average quali gap: 0.366 in Rosberg's favor (2011) 0.192 in Schumacher's favor (2012)

One of the most interesting things is just how much closer the two were in qualifying in 2012 when compared to 2011. Was this down to improvement from Schumacher? Or did Rosberg lose some of his one-lap pace?

My other question with Rosberg is that he hasn't always made the most of the opportunities he has had. Granted, he hasn't had many, but if you look back to 2009 when Williams had the DDD before most other teams, they were competitive and Rosberg didn't deliver a strong result. He was leading in Malaysia and quickly fell back to 8th. Later on he had the podium in Singapore wrapped up but made a basic error. Then in 2012 he started with a competitive car and had two very disappointing performances. The good thing about China is it showed he could get over the hump, in spite of his previous wasted opportunities. I think that's the sign of a driver who is mentally tough and learns well. He got himself a result in Monaco too, which further demonstrates that maybe China was his coming of age, that he made that step up.

tl;dr I think Rosberg has promise but ultimately he is, at best, the next Mark Webber. Both drivers spent their careers thrashing mainly sub-par team-mates and pulling off the odd impressive performance here and there, but Webber got found out when he came up against a top-line talent and the same will happen to Rosberg.

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I don't follow F1 so I don't know what I'm talking about

As for the poll question, I don't think Rosberg will suffer a Kovalainen-style humiliation at Hamilton's hands, but I do expect Nico to be comfortably beaten. But are 'we' underestimating Rosberg? I don't know. He is ranked 8th overall in the 'rank the drivers 2012' thread, behind Webber and Hulkenberg. I wouldn't rank Nico behind Hulk, but otherwise that seems fair. So no, 'we' don't understimate him.

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I don't follow F1 so I don't know what I'm talking about

I think its very easy to downgrade a driver when the car he is driving isn't up to scratch, at the beginning of the season when the car was competitive Rosberg was in contention for the WDC and dominated the China GP, in the second half of the season it was very poor.

When Schumacher retired in 2006 he was very much the benchmark, since his return no one can really know what level he managed to get back to, but he wasn't able to beat Rosberg and Rosberg should get some credit for that

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PFI Pick 10 Competition

Current Standing: 16th

Also as much as we like with driver rankings car performance comes into play as well, he did well to rank as high in what turned out to be a disappointing car

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PFI Pick 10 Competition

Current Standing: 16th

Are there people who think Lewis will drive circles around Nico? Yeah. Are they underestimating Nico? Probably. Do most people think it will be a pretty close fight? Yeah. Are they right? Probably.

Its unlikely anyone can walk into a new team for the FIRST time and truly own a very good driver who has been with that team for many years. Nico is extremely smart, already knows how the team works, has relationships within it, has always been competitive even when his Merc has been garbage, and given he's driven alongside Michael for so many years there is no reason why he should feel any undue pressure from Lewis joining the team. The car, like everyone else's, is a total unknown so there's no telling where on the grid either of them should start out.

If the car is a front runner, Lewis might have a bit of an advantage as he knows what its like to fight for wins regularly. If the car is closer to its form from previous years I think Nico has a small advantage in that Lewis really only has experience in F1 in a team at the front, and being further back is discouraging. Its a battle I'm looking forward to.

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Good assessemnt by Ashley, and as usual Blinky 's makes so much sense.
Even if the Mrecedes is not a front-runner, the Nico vs Lewis battles should be interesting.
Wonder if they will remain friends?

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http://grandprixratings.blogspot.com

Only twitter will tell...

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Räikkönen - Vettel - Rosberg - Bottas

Hamilton himself said Rosberg is one of the best he just needs a car good enough to show it.

http://www.yallaf1.com/2011/06/01/hamil ... d-rosberg/

Personally, I rate Rosberg as one of the second division drivers - good number twos, who can bring the car home, but not one of the elite. My expectation is that it'll be Hamilton ahead most of the time, Rosberg occasionally close or slightly ahead, Hamilton occasionally a long way ahead. Lewis has the ability to get the best out of the car pretty much whatever the circumstances, Rosberg needs the car to be how he likes it to get the best from it. Lewis will win next season, though probably not in a normal race, most likely in the wet. Rosberg won't.

I know there is plenty of knowledgeable people in this forum therefore keen to ask if tests in Jerez & Barcelona could indicate an overall trend for the upcoming season regarding Rosberg vs. Hamilton battle?


By the way:

Only twitter will tell... -f'ing hilarious! LOL

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Unfortunately the test days ask more questions than they answer.

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D. Ciesa about Lewis & Nico back at karting days:

(source: Lewis Hamilton, the full story ( book))
IMo it will get tight, but Lewis will come up on top in the end

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"Everything you can imagine is real." Pablo Picasso

He won't be destroyed but i don't see him beating Hamilton over a season

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#10

I've merged these two points together as it seems like you're basically saying the same thing.

My policy on ranking a driver is that it doesn't matter how good their car is. What matters is whether they get the maximum out of their car. If, for example, there are three clearly superior cars and there's one driver in a slower car who consistently finishes 7th, then that driver is clearly getting the maximum out of their car on a consistent basis. Therefore, I'll rank them highly.

I think people generally take that into account when rating drivers. The forum overall ranks Hulkenberg ahead of Webber. Webber has become an established winner over the last four seasons while driving a top car, while Hulkenberg is entering his third year and has no podium finishes. Massa and Grosjean both had cars that were front runners on a largely consistent basis, yet this forum ranked them only 10th and 14th.

Ultimately, when I look deeper into Rosberg's strengths and weaknesses, the circumstances he has and has not excelled in, I see weaknesses in him that I don't see in the five WDCs. That has nothing to do with their cars, but more to do with consistent performance, lack of errors, great racecraft and proving themselves against quality drivers.

There are different challenges in driving different cars. In a lesser car, you'll be fighting to make up for lost time, or sometimes fighting to merely keeping your car on the road. In top cars, you more than likely have to deal with the psychological pressure of being alongside a top team-mate, and you have to constantly live up to the expectation of your team and the media. In both circumstances, it's very difficult to prove yourself.



Nobody can really know what level Schumacher managed to get back to, but what I will say is that he never made so many mistakes during his first career. And I really don't remember a time in his first career when he struggled to maximise the potential of the car. To say Schumacher was as fast in his second career as he was in his first is to say that the current drivers are clearly quicker than Schumacher's opposition. I find that hard to believe that drivers are getting faster through generations, but maybe it is true, maybe it isn't.

Rosberg gets credit for beating the drivers he has come up against so far in his career. However, he hasn't come up against an established benchmark since Webber in his rookie year (I won't judge him on that as it was seven years ago) so any perception of him is based on whether you believe Schumacher was a good benchmark or not. And IMO, he wasn't a bad benchmark, but he wasn't a great one either.

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I don't follow F1 so I don't know what I'm talking about

No. It's near enough impossible to draw any conclusions from testing, for a number of reasons, most notably fuel loads.
The first indicator will likely be on qualifying day in Australia.

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I don't follow F1 so I don't know what I'm talking about

My first thoughts were he is just an average good driver, not the top few, but then again I cant believe Schumacher had fallen as far off as it seemed. I think I will keep my powder dry on this one and see what develops.

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I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go into the other room and read a book.

Marx (Groucho)

Honestly Blinky, your post is full of rubbish. The Hamilton fans to which you refer wouldn't know the word "eviscerate".

In seriousness, though, where I have a question mark about Rosberg is with regards to his performance against Schumacher. Over their time as teammates, Schumacher improved more than Rosberg. 2010 to 2011 is not such a big deal to me because that accounted for Schumacher adjusting to the sport and so incorporated a fairly large step forward from him. But over 2011 and 2012 the relative gap between them shrunk more, whether one regards Schumacher as being better than Rosberg by the end or just closer.

I'm not talking about qualifying, but about race performance. I think Rosberg is an excellent qualifier. However race-wise I think he lacks consistency and the aggressive and opportunistic nature of the top drivers, plus I'm unsure about his capability when it comes to making different strategies work. Hamilton has his weaknesses when it comes to racing, but he does get the results and he certainly has the capability to put in some stunning race performances.

Overall I find it hard to make a firm judgement about what I think will happen next year. I agree that Hamilton is unlikely to eviscerate him in the manner suggested by some, but I wouldn't be surprised if Rosberg struggled against him.

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Formerly kai_