steoc4 wrote:
marc420 wrote:
F1 has a lot of fake journalism ... ie, 'reporters' who basically serve up press releases.
We saw this in the US with the aborted USGP team. The 'reporters' on the old US SPEED network were falling all over themselves about how wonderful this was going to be. There were no problems at all at the team, everything was just peachy-keen and wonderful, right up to the day that they had to report the press releases that the team was folding and would never make its first race.
To me, its been equally hilarious watching the british-based reporters fall all over themselves with constant announcements of how wonderful the McClaren team is.
Anyone with half a brain could guess that last season was going to be a struggle. We'd just seen the year before that only one of three teams of engineers could get one of these new engines 'right'. We'd seen the struggles that Renault had had in trying to even get an engine to be 'workable'. So, all of the pre-season hype about how wonderful McClaren was going to be was obviously a lot of hot-air. And yet, it filled the airwaves from all of the gullible 'reporters' who predictably took McClaren's press releases and reported them as 'news'.
And of course, every single week since we've seen the regular stories about how McClaren-Honda is on the verge of massive improvement and the 'is-this-the-week?' stories that somehow expect this back-marker team is going to suddenly surge to the front.
Mainly its all an excercise in showing how worthless most of the 'reporting' and 'news' about F1 really is.
While everyone did know it wasn't likely to be a success, at least it had a chance. Whereas nobody else had any chance of beating Mercedes due to the advantage that they had locked in over Ferrari and Renault by the token regulations, and the fact that they would never allow someone else to beat them with their engine. For the good of the sport everyone including journalists wanted it to be true
So McLaren had a choice of going with Honda, and having a 5% chance of success and 95% chance of failure, or not go with Honda and have a 100% chance of mediocrity.
Williams are way ahead of McLaren right now, but one thing is for sure and that's that they will never win a championship. McLaren, as unlikely as it may be, just might pull it off if everything eventually comes together. And I respect that ambition, of not wanting to just make up the numbers.
Your post makes it sound like that Honda's the missing link and the chassis is the cat's paws. McLaren is no Red Bull, and wouldn't be winning titles with even the best engine. McLaren as an organization is a disaster, don't just lay the blame at Honda's feet.
I will repeat what I have said multiple times. Do you see a lot happening at McLaren? No. When Mercedes was going through the building phase, they were hiring people left, right and center. You heard about team building. Even had illegal tire tests. Some even said they had too many cooks, but that also meant 1 less cook at their competitors. Red Bull, they have set up the single best aero dept. under Newey, and their operation runs like a well-oiled machine. Remember the DC days when RBR was building, you knew things were turning around. Even Ferrari, which didn't live up to its 2016 hype, at least tried Haas windtunnel, and basically turned the whole organization around in trying to get results.
What has McLaren done? Nothing. You get no feeling there's stuff happening around it. Look at successful team-building phases of the past and compare that to McLaren.
Their aim is to win 3 years from now. That's so ridiculous, I cannot comprehend how they were able to sell that BS to the whole sport. Always a few races away from entering Q3. I mean, they have distorted the field to the point, where people look forward to them entering Q3 like it's an achievement. This team is supposed to win titles. Yeah, that'll happen.