Club Arnage

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Never saw that coming! I assume you mean Ralf ;D

Shui was junior team member in the early 90's I suppose, good pr for merc as well.

No, I suspect he may have found that he was not on the pace when he had his run last year in the ferrari.

I dont think he has the same vanity/ego problems Mansell and Villenerve had.

Didn't it say Schumacher had left Ferrari, as Alonso doesn't like him.

Its all starting to fit

anyone who doesn't pose a threat Peter..... fairly tough to find in the F1 paddock one would imagine. Cheating, racist, overblown, undertalented, big headed pr1ck. 

The sooner he is banned and left to rot with Briatore, the better in my opinion....

Both Schumacher and Raikkonen have been linked to this drive, and it will probably end up being Heidfeld.  Schumacher still has a contract with Ferrari, even if he's no longer an advisor to the F1 team.  Can't see Fiat releasing him to go work for Mercedes.  And doesn't he have a screwed up neck?  Schumacher needs to go back to crashing motorcyles...
Fax

That'll give Jean Todt a direct line in to Mercedes, as well as Ferrari.

The creepy fingers of Ferrari control slip even deeper in to F1...

http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns21988.html

The new share owner in williams Toto Wolff, also has strong links tho Mercedes via HWA, the company he co owns.

guess that the telly today confirms the thread title then. 

MG Mark

See your finger is still on the pulse Fax.   ;)

Got to admit I didn't see Ferrari going for this, but where there's enough money, there's a way to get it done.  Hmmm, Schumacher's back in the sport?  Give's me a even better reason not to give a rats ass about F1 this coming season.
Fax

I'm quite looking forward to it. Brawn had some luck this year thanks to Honda and I expect them to be found out in due course. These comebacks rarely go well, see Nigel's fat arse for details, and whilst I found Schumacher an unpleasant individual, he can't half pedal a barge. It will be fun seeing all this, plus the massive budgets, sponsorship pull-outs, new half-arsed teams and the withdrawal of the manufacturers, come along together. 'Appy days  :)

Should be interesting. I can't see Nico being overawed by him. And i don't think he will get away with the swerving across the track in front of other drivers now he no longer has the backing of Ferrari International Assistance.

Sorry, I yawned, again.

I'm with you landman, YAWN!  I've tried, I've really tried to find something exciting and redeeming about F1 in recent years, especially since Schumacher's retirement, but I've given up.  It's absolute crap, spoon fed to unsuspecting consumers by Bernie.  I used to care enough to actually be mad about the way GP racing has evolved, but I can't even be bothered anymore.  Apathy is a good to describe it.
RIP F1, you were once the most majestic sport on the planet.
Fax

Roll on the start of the MotoGP season, watch some proper racing... I think this will be a really competitive year.

>Martini...LB

The Brawn/schumacher partnership is bound to generate some interesting tacitical moves, shame Ross has bought in schumi rather than bring on new tallent.

Fax - How can you justify that?  the 2008 championship was decided 2 corners away from the finish, in the last race of what had been a roller coaster season. 

Last season became more predictable, but there was alot of overtaking - alot of on track action, and some interesting off track antics as well. Plus a fairytale debut season for a privateer team.

Schumachers return adds fuel to what was already a nicely smouldering fire - I have a feeling it will have a similar effect as shoving dynamite on it! 

2 British Champs in the same team.  Schumacher. Alonso in a Ferrari. Red Bull pushing their way through the field. 26 (?) cars. Drivers having to cope with changing cars as fuel loads go down.

All in all - it has classic season written all over it - I guess from where you are - you'll not get disappointed, and from where I am, I am set up to be let down - but this is the most excited I've been about an F1 season for years.

Merry Xmas - Hope you've had a good one.

Brad

Its very simple Brad why I find F1 so pathetic now, because I was a fan of it when it was glorious.  Today its become basically a made for TV extravaganza, at its core an expensive spec formula, with suffocating technical regulations.  The races are held, with a couple of exceptions, mostly on over-sized karting tracks, with the facilities for the posers taking priority over the layout of the circuit  And most of the off track antics are juvenile and embarassing, hardly befitting the legacy of a sport that gave of the likes of Fangio, Moss, Clark, Stewart, etc. And I'm still trying to come up of all the overtaking you mention, most of the overtaking I saw was in the pits.  From where I stand its no different than NASCAR in that its gradually been dumbed down to make it more appealing to the mainstream stick & ball fans, with hyping the drivers and team principals taking priority.  Its not about racing anymore, its about selling t-shirts and hats to Joe Blow on the steet, and selling luxury suites at the track to the guy in the corporate office so he can impress his clients, you know, taking them to see the pinnacle of the sport and all that, because Bernie says that what it is.
The other night as I watched a DVD of the '86 Austrian GP that a friend has given me, it was mind boggling to realize the depth's to which F1 has sunk in a little over twenty years.
Hope you had a good Christmas too Brad,
Fax

IMHO I think the racing over the last 2 years has improved and may even surpass that of the 80's, which if we take off the rose tinted glasses was often dull and dominated by 3 teams, Mclaren, Ferrari and Williams. Overtaking all but stopped with the advent of Ground effect and has only now started to become popular again. Next year without refueling then it will become even more key to winning.

The drivers are stage managed to the point they cannot move without handlers and PR people during races, however when they are let off, from my friends experiance with LH and the seedy world of nitro R/C cars they are very grounded and good company. This does not only affect F1, but all sports and the top players so maybe its unfair to pick on F1.

In the 50's when Moss, Hawthorne and collins was around the press followed there every move, yet only reported the good points and, if a current driver shagged his way around europe then it would be headline news with an obvious knock on to sponsors.

The teams and tracks are part of a huge PR monster, again the same affects football (scoccer and Amercian), and almost every other sport. money is king.

In life, three things are certain.  Tax. Death. Change.

Yes F1 has changed. It's still the cutting edge of motorsports, as it was throughout the 60's, 70's, 80's and most of the 90's.

I refer you to this link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUeEBe2fL_s (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUeEBe2fL_s)  I say F1 has got more exciting - it's not the same as 20 years ago, but at least now it's racing, not purely tactical - and next year - I think you'll find this will become even more the case....

You guys can keep drinking Bernie's Kool-Aid, I'm done with it.  If I want to go watch spec cars, with rev limiters and all that crap, hell I can go watch the IRL.  I'm sticking with the bikes and sportscars, see you in March at at real racing circuit, not some shitty little monument to Bernie's ego in the Middle Eastern desert somewhere.
Fax

Peter,

Sorry about the yawning, but The Ego has never "done it" for me, ever.

To me this return is just all about his ego & sod everybody else.

There are loads of younger, talented drivers who deserve the breaks he got.

If all of the old gits decide to return then we'll never get another JB/LH.

Someone had to make way for Michael once, he should have the good sense to realise this himself.

Just hope that he has a minor/non-injury shunt that brings him to his senses early in the season & he decides to hang up his helmet once & for all.

Now, back to my yawning...

Yeah - Bertrand Gachot got himself thrown in the hoosegow.  ;D

Had to look both Bertrand Gachot and hoosegow.

I am now enlightened  ;D

Without doubt these returns mostly end the same way, however if he can prove himself as fast as he was before, then its ups to the youngsters to knock him of his perch.

dispite my own misgivings about him and no one detests the way he drove in the past more than me, i cant help but admire his ability. there have been few better drivers than him in the current era.

Brad, the IRL engine spec require a 10,500 rev limit on their 3.5 liter unit, F1 specs are 18,000 on the 2.4 liter engines.  Both end up at roughly 700 BHP.
As I've said, they're both crap!  Anytime your limiting engine revs, especially when your supposed to be the pinnacle of the sport as F1 once was, its fake, manipulated and over-regulated.  Essentially what it does is give everyone the same engine.  For the one thousandth time...spec racing is for club racing and junior formula's, not for any form of the sport that is supposed to be cutting edge.
Fax

I still think that 8,000 rpm sounds nicer, but F1 is F1, and will we end up with 500cc motors that rev to 50,000.

I still think that the Group C regulations have the answer.  Allow any engine but only  X gallons of fuel for the race, and then they have to get clever, plus we all benefit from the research into economy

Couldn't agree more Lorry, the turbo era was a bit like that, you had 1400 BHP on tap but only so much fuel onboard.  It was a thinking man's race.  A F1 race now is just a dumbed down series of F3 races thrown together.
Fax

Thanks for the support Fax ;)

Something has to be wrong with F1, when you can buy a team for next to nought in February, and win the next 6 races. ::)  And take my advice Schumacher, it won't happen again

So thats why we go to Le Mans ;D

But if they start singing from the same hymnsheet its all over :'(

I agree about the Grp C regs, they should be the basis of the current ACO ones. Hang on I think the ACO do restrict the total amount of fuel a car can use.

The Brawn team did not spring out of nowhere, and the prime reason it was the class of 09, at least for the first six months was that the team when it was Honda had given up on the 08 car and started the 09 car way ahead of McLaren and Ferrari. Neither had it down down the KERs route.

In many ways the success of Brawn, shows that F1 is in better health now than it has been for a while. It proves that clever design and good team leadership when combined with a strong engine and good drivers can make an inpact.

Fax's comparison with the turbo cars is interesting, the cars did have the potential of 1400bhp for a flying lap, but the supply of those engines was restricted to only a few drivers, combine that with the special tyres those same drivers had and it was then looking like a closed shop and the rest where only fighting for the minor places.

Hopefully it has opened up a bit now, the engines have a cap on power (a bit like the fuel restricted turbo era) so the designers have to play with other ways to improve, the relibility of the cars is now amazing, which could show how understressed they are.

Even with the all the restrictions, a F1 car is still the fastest form of racing on a road circuit.

So aside form the circus aspect of some tracks and the obvious greed of BE they are more postives to F1 now than say 3 years ago.

And I agree about MS, he wont find it easy, but it will be fun watching him try.