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I know this is something that hasn't happened, but if it was Hamilton that had retired this previous race and not Bottas, Bottas would be at leased 8 points ahead of Hamilton in the drivers championship. Will people still be saying Hamilton is the obvious driver for Mercedes to be backing even though at this point in time, he has less points? It has only been 5 races. If this had been the case, we have got a race coming up soon where Bottas is usually incredibly strong. In Canada, he qualified 3rd in 2013, and then has got a podium result in the past couple of years too. I feel this could be a race where he may be as strong or better than Hamilton. But we will see. In Monaco though, I really don't know what to expect from Bottas. I don't think he's ever been bad there, but the Williams has been terrible there every year he's been with the team.

Then the race after Canada is Baku, which certainly didn't look like Hamilton was a fan of it last year. That was probably his worst weekend in ages. He locked up himself in Q1 causing a yellow flag and having to reverse back out onto the track, then in Q2, locks up in turn 7 nearly hitting the wall and having to reverse out again. Then, in Q3, he locked up again in turn 17 this time having to reverse out yet again. Then in Q3, he crashed. Although Bottas does make mistakes every now and then, I don't think he has ever made this many so close together. Even though in the race, Hamilton did have a few technical issues, it still certainly still wasn't a very strong performance by him. But I don't think many people will disagree with this. It was one very poor weekend which Hamilton very rarely has. But it does make me think that if Hamilton happens to have a retirement in one of the next 3 races, Bottas could well catch up and be about level with Hamilton's championship points. But yes, in the end, I still am pretty certain it will be Hamilton that beats him, and probably by some margin. Having 2 very competitive teams at the top will probably make the gap between Hamilton and Bottas by the end of the year look much larger than it did with Rosberg and Hamilton in the past 3 years. But I don't see why Bottas won't be able to get closer like Rosberg did if we give him more time in years to come. That is if Mercedes decide to keep him. I still think Bottas is very likely to remain with them next year though.

Bottas has at leased clearly had one very good race weekend clearly looking stronger than his team mate. He's also been pretty good at qualifying too. I feel one of the main reasons it looks like he isn't doing as well is because of how competitive Ferrari now are. When Bottas was qualifying in Australia, he may have been 3rd, but he was infact closer to Hamilton's time than Rosberg had ever been. Not bad at all for your very first qualifying with your team. And I also think he's been a brilliant team player, certainly better than Rosberg ever was. It also seems that whenever I see Hamilton speaking to Bottas, it all just looks more relaxed than it did when he was with Rosberg. They seem to get on better and from what Hamilton has said in interviews, he seems to really respect what Bottas has done for the team so far.

I seem to be more confident in Bottas's ability than many others are but either me or who disagree with me could be proven wrong. Lets wait and see how he performs.

That's all well and good but in what way is it related to Malaysia 2013?

I guess DNF's are unpredictable so you have to ignore them, because Bottas could just as likely have another DNF. But yes, I agree with your overall point that if Bottas ends up ahead of Hamilton in the points (for whatever reason) then no way are Merc going to be making him Bottas' wing man. I don't think Hamilton would accept it until such time as he pretty much can't win the WDC, and unfortunately for Bottas, having a 3x WDC as a team mate does put him at a disadvantage in a team.

If you have two drivers in a team who are basically on a par, then the team can basically play the wait and see game and then put their efforts behind the one who has the points advantage. But if you have one superstar driver and one guy who had never previously won a race, while you might say that you will do that, the reality is that the superstar driver is going to expect to be in it until he mathematically can't win, whereas the other guy will have to capitulate a lot sooner, especially if he doesn't have a contract for next year... (Massa always seemed to be in this position, always looking for his contract extension... and on the backfoot).

I completely agree on the Bottas DNF analysis and did a similar post a few pages back on the influence of a DNF being so huge. Basically Hamilton has out performed Bottas 4-1 in races but could be 8 points behind him if it was Hamilton who took that DNF in Spain, which was entirely down to pot luck who got that bad engine/installation in Spain. Last year it was Hamilton who got that initial failure that set of a sequence of events for 3 engine penalties and a DNF, if it had been the other way around in 2016 it would have been Hamiltons easiest title, wrapped up with 4-5 races to go. The same for 2014 when Hamilton had 2 DNFs in the first 8 races and Nico 0.

The "true" WDC table should read 98-78, Hamilton +20 which would be a fair reflection of the season so far and DNFs influencing things really sucks and you have to feel for Bottas. Similarly if 2017 was like 2014-2016 and Hamilton took the Spain DNF, Bottas would lead the WDC and it would be exactly like 2014.

I don't agree with the experience thing though of a new guy vs 3x WDC, if you are fast and winning races the team backs you. Hamilton this year has been in contention to win 4 of the 5 races whilst Bottas has been in contention for only 1. That is why he won't be backed on current form regardless of if he was +8 points ahead of Hamilton. Maybe his form will change though. Switch their results and Bottas would be the one in a very strong position to getting all the backing.

He learned it from nowhere! Just the usual hyperbole.

Is there always malice and conspiracies involved when personnel is changed within the teams? Or are you just so fixed on seeing Lewis as a victim that you need to invent circumstances to support your view?

Yes, because.....Ze Germans!

Brawn got fired because the Germans were upset. So upset, in fact, that they let the Englishman win 2 titles with the team after that just to be ironic. And since their German guy almost lost the title under his watch, they even kicked Lowe out in exchange for a blonde, blue-eyed Finn.

You can read about it in Brawn's book. He doesn't mention anything about it, of course, but why would they need Lowe when they had Brawn? Why would they need Allison when they had Lowe? Because....I don't even know why anymore, but clearly you can see how Lewis is the victim here, can't you?

Letting 2 drivers fight for a title in a two horse race is different to this season. Whichever driver put in Bottas' season thus far has a weak hand and if it was Hamilton he would be even worse because he wouldn't even have the get out of jail free card of being new to the team and he is a 3x WDC and the expectation that comes with that.

It all depends on what is meant by support, but if Bottas had performed better in 4 out of 5 races and was 50 points ahead then surely you back him for the title. But if he is ahead that often it usually sorts itself out. Massa was not supposed to be the title challenger in 2008 but it sorted itself out because he was just better than Kimi and as it turns out Kimi only let him by once in China as Kimi was usually always behind.

Look what happened to Kimi too, he was the star driver signed by Ferrari. Didn't live up to expectations and was paid not to drive for them, something that hasn't happened ever before. They were looking to remove him from the team 18 months after signing him in mid 2008.

If Bottas came in and was clearly better then Hamilton would go the way of Kimi and wouldn't be getting 20m a year, F1 would have its new star. F1 is sink or swim for me, if you aren't quick enough you don't last long and if you do last its in a reduced role ala Kimi now vs 2007.

Vettel, who did lose to Ricciardo but its not like Ricciardo was miles quicker was kind of fortunate to get the Ferrari seat when he did. If Ricciardo did the same to Vettel in 2015 then no way do Ferrari sign Vettel for big money. They would have signed Ricciardo. I for one, really want to see Ricciardo vs Vettel part II, hopefully at Ferrari.

Maybe dramatic, but I think he is somewhat right. They did bring Lowe in to replace Brawn, but not straight away, it was over a year's period. Brawn wanted to be the one and only point of reference if I remember correctly. They had arguments about his role of team principal and in the end he left. He wasn't marginalised of course as pokerman suggested, they did want him to stay as Lauda has mentioned many times. But Merc wanted to split the role between more people instead of having one person as a team principal, or something along these lines.

He has opened up and admitted since that his biggest grief was Lauda and Toto, he couldn't work with them and couldn't trust them.

Look what happened to Kimi too, he was the star driver signed by Ferrari. Didn't live up to expectations and was paid not to drive for them, something that hasn't happened ever before. They were looking to remove him from the team 18 months after signing him in mid 2008. If Bottas came in and was clearly better then Hamilton would go the way of Kimi and wouldn't be getting 20m a year, F1 would have its new star. F1 is sink or swim for me, if you aren't quick enough you don't last long and if you do last its in a reduced role ala Kimi now vs 2007.

The story of Kimi's first tenure at Ferrari is a strange one. He didn't beat Massa comprehensively in '07, but he did come out on top in the end and had a very strong finish to the year. Then, in '08, Kimi won 2 out of the first 4 races while Massa retired from the first race, and then self-spun and crashed in the second race in Malaysia. I don't think anyone at that time predicted that Kimi would go winless for the rest of the year. He probably would have won in France had it not been for the freaky exhaust pipe failure. He was also cruising to a win in Spa until rain came down. Still, it seems like something happened at that time that made Kimi under-perform. I've seen wild speculation that Ferrari were actually sabotaging him to an extent because they did want to make room for Alonso, and Massa seemed a better fit for a #2 driver. I am not big on conspiracy theories so this probably just a rumor, but it is strange how that played out.

Kimi had a solid start to 2008, two good races from the first 4. But the last 14 races, Massa was better in about 11 of them over which period Massa won 5 races and Kimi 0. Although really that figure might have been closer to 5-1 without Kimi's bad luck in France, Massa's bad luck in Hungary and discounting Massa's lucky Spa win. Massa had never before and has never since enjoyed such superiority over a team mate than that run.

Kimi also stayed in the title fight until Europe because he had 1 none points finish up until that point whilst Massa had 4. He also made more points costing errors than Massa and had better reliability/pit wall luck than him over the season. Massa should have won the title quite easily that year but he under performed in the wet races and lost more points to individual and teams errors which allowed Hamilton a title run.

Having a 'solid start to the season' is simply not good enough for a guy who was brought in to replace Schummacher in his pomp. The very fact that Massa was in contention for the title speaks volumes to the machinery he had at hand. Schummacher must have been tearing his hair out watching those two bumbling their way through with amateurish performances. Kimi has always been overrated even Ferrari noticed and paid him bucketload not to drive.

I agree with basically all you have put. I am not sure if you agree but Mercedes would have used Hamilton to hold up Vettel in Spain if the roles were reversed. It was a no brainer in that specific scenario.

Hamiltons status as a 3x WDC would probably buy him a few more races but if we continue our reverse role scenario, if Bottas beat Hamilton again in Monaco and Canada that would be 6 in 7 races and even with Hamiltons status in the team I feel that is good bye for his title hopes. Approx 60 points behind and being absolutely dominated.

Back to real world - I think the same for Lewis, if he out performs Bottas in the next 2 races, avoids a DNF and extends the gap to him I can see him being supported which will probably just mean being allowed to pit before Bottas if he is behind him in a race. Which as we all know is as good as letting him through.

I also agree with where Bottas slots in pace wise, especially 1 lap pace means he will probably out qualify Lewis quite a few times this year. But the flip side of this is that he out qualified Vettel or got very close to him twice already this year and will start many races P2 behind Lewis where as if he was a bit slower he would likely be 3rd behind Vettel nearly all the time. A Ferrari 1-2 on the grid I feel is a lot less likely, although to be fair they have had one already.

He also did in Russia what no real number 2 can really do and I guess we need to see more races to see if that was really him doing an awesome job or him just doing his usual and Hamilton having an absolute nightmare and 0.5-0.6 (like Singpaore last year) off his usual whilst the Mercedes had the clear best car that weekend. I guess time will tell, probably a bit of both to be honest but mostly Hamilton way off.

Viewed in isolation, perhaps you're right - however, you can't forget Bahrain, where Lewis was let by (TWICE) after he explicitly promised the team that he'll let Bottas go through again if he was unable to pass Vettel. Except this weekend (with Vettel getting the new clutch system - though we don't know if it was only because one was available, or because Kimi didn't want to change), there is no evidence of Ferrari backing one driver over the other. History has also shown Ferrari losing titles due to not favouring one driver over the other early enough (think 2008) - I don't think Merc should be let off that easily just because they like to pretend they don't have a #1 and a #2 for good PR. When push comes to shove, you see the true colours.

I actually thought they both drove quite well in 2007. It was 2008 when the wacky races started (although their main rival was little better in this respect it has to be said)

This Mercedes seems like a really fickle beast, Vettel could win this by having a solid car every single race weekend whilst Mercedes are at sea even if the Ferrari isn't quikcer overall. 8th and 10th in Monaco in FP2 are clueless to why after topping FP1 quite comfortably. Hamiltons Russia nightmare and Bottas has had at least one slow stint in 4 of the 5 races including being well off in Bahrain. Hamilton said pre-race that this car is quick but a real challenge to set up. Not good at a track like Monaco where drivers just get quicker and quicker through the weekend as they dial it in. It wouldn't surprise me if Hamilton did a Baku (by over driving) here this weekend.

The thing with Russia was that he managed to get the Ferraris in between him and Lewis, that situation won't happen too often and I hope that if Bottas would be leading with Lewis second they don't feel the need to cost Bottas wins. I guess it depends on how tight the WDC is, and if they care about it that much... after all a 1-2 scores the same points for the team whatever the order. I understand the whole team order situation, but given the amount of store put into statistics by some F1 fans, it seems wrong to deny a driver a race win. I mean we all know Mika Salo 'won' a race for Ferrari, but the history books show he didn't. Similarly it would be annoying if at the end of the year Lewis has won 7 races and Bottas 2, but Bottas had to let Lewis past twice. It distorts perception, a bit like qualifying results, when one driver is 13-7 over a season but one driver had mechanical issues in three sessions.. it's all about the headline and not about the actualities.

How can they be called "clueless", when they have said they know exactly what they did wrong??

I only read the Hamilton interview immediately after in which he said he had no idea why they were so slow from FP1 to FP2 have they figured it out now then? I know it was tyres but they don't no the cure is more what I meant.
This could easily be another Singapore 2015, Mercedes were 1-2 in FP1 then too.

The team mate paradox, replace Hamilton with Massa and Bottas would give the perception he is having a great season so far (judging by how he beat Massa at Williams). Remove Schumacher at the end of 2006 from the Ferrari team and Massa jumps from good/mediocre to a top driver in some peoples eyes. Exactly the same as what happened with Irvine who fought for the title in 1999 in Schumachers absence, Michael gets back in the car and is 0.5-1 second per lap quicker than him right away. The same as he would have been much quicker than Massa in 2007 which would have been a 2002/2004 style title win.

Remove Mansell from the 1992 F1 season and Patrese wins 7 races from 10 finishes (and is unlucky to not win more) and the title very easily but he was awful that year. Average/good drivers can win and challenge for titles if they have the car and a fellow average/good driver alongside them. Massa had by the far the worst luck in 2007 of all the title contenders and would have been in the title hunt at the final race if the luck was a bit more even.

Sandman and some will remember my posts on Mercedes "strange" car.. When will it be Bottas's turn?

Wow.. Just wow..

Hmm I wonder when Bottas will finally get a bad Merc


http://mobi.supersport.com/Motorsport/formula1/video/877614

Hmm I wonder when Bottas will finally get a bad Merc


http://mobi.supersport.com/Motorsport/formula1/video/877614

Desperate and ridiculous much?? I was talking about setup..

Now that's desperate

"I wasn't talking about that kind of misfortune, I was only talking about this kind of misfortune"

Desperate and ridiculous much?? I was talking about setup..

Or maybe Bottas simply did a better job at finding the right setup this weekend? It's not solely the engineers' responsibility to set the car up.

Misfortune? Or bad Engineering(setup)? It seems you dont know what I (we) are talking about.

Pedantry will get ya nowhere. A broken PU is worse than poor setup every day of the week

So how fast was Bottas in China? And in Bahrain? And in Australia in the first stint?
Bottas did an awesome job today. But to deny there is something "wrong" with this car is simply refusing to see the reality.
We will talk again when Bottas will be nowhere in the race. Just wait and see.

I don't deny that the Mercedes appears very sensitive to car setup; both drivers have struggled at times this year. But I don't see this as a reason to absolve the driver of all responsibility when they can't get the setup right, particularly when their teammate can. Indeed it's the challenging circumstances that separate the truly great drivers from the merely very good.