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It would be really nice if they tweaked the hybrid rules to suit Cadillac
I think the obvious that most folks seem to be missing is that Caddy is owned by General Motors.
I think you’ll find it hard looking for laughs if you think they’re going to be a comedy set-up.
Nah, you misunderstand me. If I was any good at Photoshop, I'd be grafting sidepods and wings onto pictures of a pimped out Escalade with 20" Chrome rims...
I think the obvious that most folks seem to be missing is that Caddy is owned by General Motors
Well aware of that, but GM also own Chevrolet who at least make sports cars (well, American sports cars). Their choice to use the Cadillac brand is what puzzles me.
I think it's a bit lame that the largest car manufacturer in the US wants to join F1 and use someone else's power unit. Either do it properly right from the start or don't bother.
Still puzzled why F1 want to keep on attracting Car companies to start teams.
Don’t they remember the early 2000’s when they all came in, didn’t win and then exited a few years later, and left the sport in a mess???
Either do it properly right from the start or don’t bother
best of both worlds for GM. They get to be in F1, the investment is cheap and “not really” a works team, so if it goes pear shaped they just get to walk away. If Andretti is successful, then GM can take the time to build new engines in a few years after they know what they’re doing.
I will bet money that other car firms will watch with interest. Right now it’s a perfect time to get into F1 where there’s an actual return on your investment.
Their choice to use the Cadillac brand is what puzzles me.
GM slimmed down their brands after the recession 15 years ago. Chevy is their affordable brand, Cadillac is their luxury brand, but that includes performance vehicles to compete with BMW, etc.
Problem for me is that I doubt that GM top management understand what it will take to become competitive. They will basically need to hire someone like Binotto and just give him a billion dollars and five years, then stand back and let him run things as he pleases. I can't see that happening - they will want quarterly progress updates and probably think they'll be winning championships within the first two or three years.
^^^
Yeah, Vlad approves!
Too much mocking of Cadillac. The CTSV was THE best sports saloon of the past decade. Better than Mercedes, BMW and Audi. They can build a great engine and chassis. Let’s see what they come up with.
Cadillac have been competing in Prototype in the IMSA championship, as part of GM Corvette have notable success in Gt endurance racing- including type wins at Le Mans ……. And Andretti are super successful too. Sounds great to me 🤷♂️
Cadillac have been competing in Prototype in the IMSA championship, as part of GM Corvette have notable success in Gt endurance racing- including type wins at Le Mans ……. And Andretti are super successful too.
Indycar runs spec chassis and aero kits, and there are only two engine manufacturers. It still takes a decent amount of tech knowhow to set up the cars and win championships, but F1 is an order of magnitude more complex (and expensive). The last couple of decades have been dominated by Chip Ganassi and Penske (like Red Bull and Merc in F1), with Andretti like Ferrari, McLaren, or Renault - often competitive, winning a championship here and there, but never really delivering on the promise.
The Corvettes are impressive cars, but their engine technology is pretty basic. Nothing in that program will be relevant to setting up an F1 engine program. The Chevy IndyCar engine is build by Ilmor (which is no longer connected to the Mercedes F1 engine program). Ilmor and Honda are struggling to supply the existing Indycar teams, they've delayed the introduction of new generation engines because they just don't have the resources to develop new engines and supply the existing ones. Which means that the existing Ilmor engineers and factory can't contribute anything to an F1 program.
It's not impossible that GM and Andretti will succeed in F1, but it will be extremely difficult and their Indycar and IMSA experience won't really be much use. They will need to hire experienced F1 technical staff, give them the budget to set up a world-class factory, and then give them five years to build a competitive team. I hope they succeed but, realistically, they are more likely to end up like Jaguar, BMW, or Toyota than Mercedes.
They have to convince F1 first!
It’s my understanding that they aren’t planning on building an F1 engine initially, just doing a tie-in (possibly with Honda).
Building a mid-field chassis shouldn’t be too difficult with GMs resources.
Decent article as to why Andretti/Cadillac isn't being greeted with open arms...
It’s my understanding that they aren’t planning on building an F1 engine initially, just doing a tie-in (possibly with Honda).
Have Honda actually confirmed that they have any interest in helping GM? Why would they? There is some speculation about that, based on Honda and GM cooperating on road car EV technology, but that has pretty much zero relevance for F1.
Building a mid-field chassis shouldn’t be too difficult with GMs resources.
Does GM have an F1 grade wind-tunnel that is sitting idle? Do they have the test rigs and simulators needed to develop an F1 car sitting idle? Do they have an engine factory with hundreds of technicians experienced in developing and building F1 engines sitting idle?
The answer to all those questions is "no." Which means they have two years to build state of the art facilities and hire staff, then one year to actually build a car to compete in 2026. They are looking at a customer Renault engine deal (because Renault have no customers and will be required to supply engines under the rules). GM can afford to pay for an F1 program, but nothing they are doing now will transfer. They will need to set up new facilities and hire experience technical staff from other teams. Not impossible, but extremely difficult. Running around the back of the field competing with Haas and Williams will not be what GM management expect from a works backed programme.
LOL - welcome to F1 Michael - F1 has always been and always will be about greed and self interest! 🙂
Former Mercedes Chief Strategist James Vowles to be the new Williams Team Principle. I wish him all the luck and hope he and Williams do well, but I'll be honest startegy hasn't always been my favourite part of the Mercedes team
Williams appoint James Vowles as new team principal - https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1/64260044
Seems like quite a step up from strategist to TP! Good luck to him.
Seems like quite a step up from strategist to TP! Good luck to him.
There's no gardening leave which means that Merc have agreed to release him. He was apparently favourite to replace Toto as Merc TP when he eventually steps down. My guess is that this gives Vowles some experience running a team so he'll be ready to take over at Merc when Toto retires. It's always possible that Toto is the mystery owner of Williams, of course.
Jenny Gow suffered a stroke 2 weeks ago....hope she recovers fully, I like her input on the radio 5 commentary
Oh 😢
Jenny Gow suffered a stroke 2 weeks ago….hope she recovers fully, I like her input on the radio 5 commentary
Oh wow, that is a shocker. She is very young to have that! Really unlucky, she always seemed like a very likeable person
Bugger, that is really bad news, I love the chequered flag podcast with her at the helm.😢
Shocked to hear about Jenny, hope she make a good recovery.
I think it’s a good signing for Williams, though probably no chance of signing Bottas
Gossip Monday...
https://twitter.com/EngineMode11/status/1614916338354475008?cxt=HHwWgMC-mdD2quksAAAA
Christ, Williams the team that turned up for testing without a car, Porche the engine manufacturer that doesn't have facilities to build an engine. I can see some synergy happening there.
Toto would be a tad miffed if he's released Vowles to go and help Porsche develop an engine. But on the flipside, there's potential for the best livery on the grid.
[i]Christ, Williams the team that turned up for testing without a car, Porche the engine manufacturer that doesn’t have facilities to build an engine[/i]
All they need to do now is to employ the Ferrari Race Strategists for the full house
I watched the Mexico Formula E race on Saturday night. Never really watched it before but new Gen3 cars were getting a bit of news so I thought I'd give it a go. And, even as an F1 fan and all that that entails, I found it incredibly boring and confusing. Very nearly fell asleep at one point and thankfully I was catching up on Youtube so could skip forward.
A few things that I observed - cars that can follow very closely but seems impossible to overtake. Lucas DiGrassi managed to defend a podium position from about 20% of the way in to the race even though he was clealy slower than everyone else - think Ricciardo in Monaco with a failing car.
And the "attack mode" - you have to go offline though a virtual gateway to trigger it, during which you're likely to lose a place because as above, they can follow so close. But then the extra power that attack mode gives you is pointless because all you can do is crawl all over the back of the car in front but not actually overtake it.
And, I know this is FIA-wide, but every time a car stops on track there's about 5 laps under full safety car to allow marshalls on track. Yes it's a safety thing but surely this can be done virtually like F1 and slow them right down by restricting power to make broken car removal a couple of laps shorter? And then to top it off, they add an arbitary number of laps to the end of the race to make up for it like football stoppage time.
I think I'll stick with F1 (assuming it's not another Verstappen single-car championship this year).
Bit more involved than I thought if this is true.
https://thejudge13.com/2023/01/16/porsche-buys-williams/
Ah, buggerations. Just seen the news about Jenny Gow. I really hope she recovers well. Sad news.
Christ, Williams the team that turned up for testing without a car, Porche the engine manufacturer that doesn’t have facilities to build an engine. I can see some synergy happening there.
It can just change the badge on the Audi engine and use the same facilities
...not sure Audi will agree to that! There's 'beef' between the two companies. 🙂
…not sure Audi will agree to that! There’s ‘beef’ between the two companies. 🙂
I heard that too! Apparently the rivalry is very intense
[i]…not sure Audi will agree to that! There’s ‘beef’ between the two companies. 🙂
I heard that too! Apparently the rivalry is very intense[/i]
Surely not. Those cheating, bastard, four ringed stunt weasels are valued members of our big happy family
Can anyone lend me a few quid!!?…
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Ooo - prettiest F1 car ever, and it's the one with the interesting history! 🙂
'New' F1 car and not a murmur on here - the pre-season excitement isn't building yet! 🤣
Don't think we'll see a proper spec car till the first race.
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^^That is different from last seasons car though so there may be 2023 bits in it.
I thought Haas had just said it was a livery launch so just checked how it looked rather than searching for any 2023 clues. And as you say no teams will show any interesting developments until testing starts. That won't stop the hordes scrutinising every "launch" image that gets released by every team though.
New’ F1 car and not a murmur on here
It's a Haas, it's just a paint job 😁
Red Bull livery launch on Friday might be of interest - widely rumoured Ford will be back.
Red Bull livery launch on Friday might be of interest
It wouldn't get your hopes up, dumbed down 2022 car with slightly higher floor edges at best
– widely rumoured Ford will be back.
Currently sounds like adding some $$ and a sticker to the car. Hopefully a bit more than that, and some lessons were learned from the Jaguar shit show
Can someone explain this to me?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1/6450189 0">BBC News - Formula 1: Widespread concern after Mohammed Ben Sulayem controversies https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1/64501890
Seems to me that certain parties in F1 object to Ben Sulayem (which may be valid but the complaints seem to be fairly trivial and muck-raking in nature) but F1 have no mandate over the FIA.
So, I'm not sure whether this is significant or it's just a slow news day...?
Is there a good podcast or blog or something to provide more scope/context behind all the bickering?
Hes basically interfering with something he shouldnt, which is ruffling feathers.
Liberty own and operate F1
The FIA just set the regulations
I cant remember the number, but F1 provides the FIA with a high % of there overall total revenue, but do little in creating that value.
When it was the "Max & Bernie show" then two of them would work towards the success of F1, just usually in a "good cop/bad cop" type of approach, and turned F1 into what it is now.
Todt publicly just left F1 to it (in a typical Todt style he would have done lots in the background)
From my perspective it just seems like Ben Sulayem is out of his depth and causing hassle within F1, trying to dictate what should happen with little support from the teams.
F1 has no mandate over the FIA, but it's the biggest and most influential series the FIA sanction, so he really doesn't want to be pissing them off - the value of the series is hugely important to them, so he's really pissed them off by saying it's overpriced. Is there also an element ofconflict of interest, if he has ties to a potential buyer of F1?
Anyone watched Lucky!? Seems all right, although I still wouldn't trust him as far as I could throw him.
Can someone explain this to me?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1/64509697
So Ford are back... With a team as well as engine supplier to RB?
Nailed on with Red Bull - we'll see in ten mins when they launch the 2023 2022 car! 🙂
So Ford are back… With a team as well as engine supplier to RB?
It'll be a Red Bull engine with a Ford badge on it. The reason the Porsche deal fell through was that Red Bull refused to relinquish any control over the team. Ford will just be handing over money for the right to put stickers on the car.
The second team will be Alpha Tauri. No reason that couldn't be rebadged as a Ford team or sold to them outright, but Ford won't be starting a new team from scratch.
So ford come creeping back to f1 after not having much success with their last big involvement - whatever happened to the team they owned? 🙂 TBF their biggest claim to fame in F1 came from sticking their name on someone else's engine, so maybe that'll work again.
Bill Ford, the car manufacturer's executive chair,
Coincidence or relation?
This is a painful watch....definitely for the 'merican audience!
What an utter load of rollocks!
their biggest claim to fame in F1 came from sticking their name on someone else’s engine
TBF, the Ford-Cosworth collaboration worked really well. Building F1 engines needs a specialist department with its own facilities. Ford did an excellent job of branding with Cosworth, with high performance Fords using Cosworth developed engines. The Cosworth name just became associated with Ford performance cars, like AMG with Merc or Schnitzer with BMW. Merc initially used Ilmor to build its F1 engines, then took over the project. The Chevy Indycar engine is built by Ilmor. The Honda and Renault engines both got spun off into independent divisions (Mugen and Mecacrome/Supertec) and then taken back. Mugen is owned by the son of Soichiro Honda. Mechachrome built Renault engines right from the start, the only change was whether Renault was paying to put its name on the rocker covers.
How's the Ford branding going to work with Red Bull using Honda engines still next year? They are still using a Honda engine aren't they?
How’s the Ford branding going to work with Red Bull using Honda engines still next year? They are still using a Honda engine aren’t they?
It's for 2026
Sigh - Williams go for another 'livery launch' on last year's car and the livery isn't really that different to the 2022 car, just with added 'Gulf' stickers. Dullest pre-season ever so far.
TBH I think they'd get more media & fan interest in these if they ran a one off livery for the first test then did the full reveal of the 2023 look on the 2023 car between the test and the first race, though I expect logistics would make that tricky.
I see Horner's off on one already, talking about everything bad about their "handicap" and how they are having to deal with it, and big 'ol Mercedes and Ferrari will beat the up
Poor cheating bastards Red Bull.
Williams go for another ‘livery launch’ on last year’s car and the livery isn’t really that different to the 2022 car, just with added ‘Gulf’ stickers. Dullest pre-season ever so far.
I really don't understand why people even bother to follow the launches. No team is going to show their real car until the first test, this is just a sponsor event to show off the stickers on a mock up of a generic car.
I see Horner’s off on one already, talking about everything bad about their “handicap” and how they are having to deal with it, and big ‘ol Mercedes and Ferrari will beat the up
It'll be fun seeing Horner combust if Mercedes are a second a lap faster in the first test. And that they really did know where they had gone wrong with last years car!
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<div class="bbp-reply-author d-flex align-items-center flex-wrap"><span class="bbp-author-name">Kryton57</span>
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I see Horner’s off on one already, talking about everything bad about their “handicap” and how they are having to deal with it, and big ‘ol Mercedes and Ferrari will beat the up
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Link?
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https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/red-bull-significant-handicap-aero-testing/10428302/
And this seasons aero testing allocation...
No team is going to show their real car until the first test,
I’m not even sure you see the real car then. Merc didn’t show it’s no sidepod design until the second test
Round of applause for whoever came up with the Duracell logo placement.
They did that last season too! Seems no one noticed though! 🤣
So the "handicap" is actually an attempt to correct for their advantage gained by cheating? Not sure I'm feeling that sympathetic tbh
Slats!!!!!!!......
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Yay - a different livery on a car that is visibly different to last year's car. Yes it will have some different bits on when it rolls out for testing, but it's a start.
I thought the 'blade' roll hoops were banned this year? After Zhou's Silverstone crash.
Not banned, just a few extra design specs compared to 2022:
Why Alfa Romeo has kept its blade roll hoop on 2023 F1 car (motorsport.com)
That alfa looks amazingly cool from above
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<div class="bbp-reply-content">Yay – a different livery on a car that is visibly different to last year’s car. Yes it will have some different bits on when it rolls out for testing, but it’s a start.
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Very true but nonetheless there are some interesting bits on it according to scarbs on twitter.
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Ive never really seen the point of these launch events. They must cost a fortune to make a set of panels that wont ever see a track and paint it just to show briefly. I bet the only bits that stay the same are the wheels, steering wheel and seat
The show cars get trotted off all round the world for different events. Especially the sort of events where an F1 car might impress, but noone is looking too closely