Michelin form is no threat for Ferrari

[mansellmania]

before anyone here starts copying more useless F1 headlines from the tabloidlike autosport website i'd like to say michelins testform DOES NOT threaten ferrari, after all, testing means nothing.
and michelin needs 10000 laps before bridgestone even has to consider coming out of bed to try new wettyres.

[Aysedasi]

Ferrari fan, eh?

[mansellmania]

well considering bridgestone won the last 6 worldconstructorstrophies and despite being outnumbered in teamquantity still won double the amount of races won by michelin teams this year i think the testform of michelin is the least of the worries for bridgestone.

[Aysedasi]

True, perhaps, but times change, sometimes slowly, sometimes quicker than we expect. I don't read much into testing either, but the tide will turn against Ferrari eventually. Why? Because the dominant team never stays dominant for ever......

[mansellmania]

Originally posted by Aysedasi
True, perhaps, but times change, sometimes slowly, sometimes quicker than we expect. I don't read much into testing either, but the tide will turn against Ferrari eventually. Why? Because the dominant team never stays dominant for ever......

ill rather put it down to the great achievements by williams and renault rather than michelin.
granted they improved a lot this year but evenso they still got beaten.

dont think ferrari is threatened by the michelin testing miles... perhaps you could say michelin is threatened by ferrari... why else would michelin run 2700 laps of testing while bridgestone teams took it easy and did 500.

by the way... last year was a testing ban in place till january the 1st no?

more proof the story is bit far fetched, tabloid like and pretty useless imo.
autosport would do good to keep that damien smith from occupying important internet bandwidth with his uploading so I ( we ) can use it for online racing.

[Mr V]

Originally posted by mansellmania
before anyone here starts copying more useless F1 headlines from the tabloidlike autosport website i'd like to say michelins testform DOES NOT threaten ferrari, after all, testing means nothing.

Trying to hide your concern? Testing doesn't mean "everything", but it does mean something.

This guy,(anonymous i'm afraid), who engineers a car using Bridgestones knows a hell of a lot more than the likes of you and me, this is what he has to say....

One engineer from a Bridgestone team, who wished to remain anonymous, told AUTOSPORT: "Looking at the tyres of Michelin during the Jerez test session I am rather worried for 2004. Simple mathematics lead to the conclusion that Ferrari, Sauber, Jordan and Minardi will not be in a position to answer the six Michelin teams. More kilometres means more data and more data leads to better tyres."

(Taken from an Autosport article that MansellMania doesn't think people should listen too)

Come Melbourne, i doubt that the gap will be 2 seconds, but i'll also bet that the Bridgestone teams, and particular Ferrari, are scratching their heads.

[Aysedasi]

Originally posted by mansellmania
....so I ( we ) can use it for online racing.

You want to pop into Armchair Enthusiast some time.....

[GTRMagic]

Interesting that Sauber isnt running a full program of 3 drivers on the Friday though... budgetary concern, or a higher purpose?

[mansellmania]

Originally posted by Mr V
this is what he has to say....

One engineer from a Bridgestone team, who wished to remain anonymous, told AUTOSPORT: "Looking at the tyres of Michelin during the Jerez test session I am rather worried for 2004.*************************




Simple mathematics lead to the conclusion that Ferrari, Sauber, Jordan and Minardi will not be in a position to answer the six Michelin teams. More kilometres means more data and more data leads to better tyres."

(Taken from an Autosport article that MansellMania doesn't think people should listen too)

Come Melbourne, i doubt that the gap will be 2 seconds, ut i'll also bet that the Bridgestone teams, and particular Ferrari, are scratching their heads.

my simple mathematics told me bridgestone still won both titles in 2003 and one engineer who remains anonymous says nothing. my grandmother couldv said that.

i doubt very much it was somebody from sauber and that leaves 2 other not so highly rated teams...

michelin has every reason to test a lot and simple mathematics would tell my grandmother 6 reasonable rich teams are always bound to drive more laps than ferrari and sauber.
mclaren came with a new car and i doubt they are so busy testing rubber.williams was testing a new engine and new gearbox and, again, i doubt they tested a lot of rubber.
BAR ran a hybrid car and so does renault.

jordan and minardi dont test, they only test money.

michelin is the one that is threatened as they adapted towards bridgestone and installed sprinklerstuff at paul ricard and pull out a squad of fireengines to soak jerez.

a quick look at the 2004 schedule i dont see a cold weather race before maybe imola but thats end of april in mediteranian italy.. perhaps british gp july 4th? belgium or brasil end of october.

i dont see why the jerez testing is such a worry for this unanymous brother.
lot of hot air and a waste of space and pages in autosport.

imo

[Jordi]

Face it, there's not a lot of wet weather racing during the season, so Bridgestone better get their dry tyres sorted better...

[neilap]

Its funny that this is even an issue to us. It proves that there is reason for concern. It shows that once Ferrari falls from the top, which I think they will this year, BS will be in serious trouble. This is their fault. They treated the other tams like step children now they only have Ferrari.

Michelin tires were so superior to BS that even Toyota was faster than Ferrari at times last season. Renault, Williams and Maclaren owe a great debt to Michelin. Williams did not have a good car at all at the start of the season when it came around they were the fastest because of the tires. Michelin worked with Renault supplying them with very soft but durable tires because their chassis was so well balanced. Renault, because of Michelin had the best cornering speeds of all the F1 cars last year. The GA which was to be the best Ferrari ever did not look that great. As a matter of fact,where they excelled is when tires matter the least, top speed.

Ferrari, BS and the BS runners are in trouble this year unless they come up with some dramatic improvements to their dry compounds.

[Gt_R]

I agree with neilap. It isn't hard to see that Michelin were the better tyres last season (prior Italy). Michelins huge improvements are impressive, and Bridgestone is struggling to match it. They are lucky to win the WDC/WCC this year and hence avoid the huge criticisms.

BS had to pull up their socks. This year's Ferrari looked average because the tyres don't measure up, hence erasing a proportion of the advantage of the car.

[GTRMagic]

Unless of course Bridgestone are foxing

[mansellmania]

Originally posted by neilap
It proves that there is reason for concern. It shows that once Ferrari falls from the top, which I think they will this year, BS will be in serious trouble. This is their fault. They treated the other tams like step children now they only have Ferrari.

Michelin tires were so superior to BS that even Toyota was faster than Ferrari at times last season. Renault, Williams and Maclaren owe a great debt to Michelin. Williams did not have a good car at all at the start of the season when it came around they were the fastest because of the tires. Renault, because of Michelin had the best cornering speeds of all the F1 cars last year. The GA which was to be the best Ferrari ever did not look that great. As a matter of fact,where they excelled is when tires matter the least, top speed.

Ferrari, BS and the BS runners are in trouble this year unless they come up with some dramatic improvements to their dry compounds.

heh

i saw an written off/minardi dicing jordan car win the 2003 brasil GP and in the process overtake a michelin shod mclaren.
those little teams have no money to invest in testcars purely for tyres and the more impressive it was and is for jordan and fisichella.

the dominance of ferrari in 2002 was partly blamed bcs mclaren and williams needing 2 different compounds for their cars.michelin came up with middle-of-the-road spec and both teams got shafted with one overusing its rears(williams) and the other not generating enough heat in them(mclaren).
and now you're already accusing bridgestone of single mind track behaviour if ferrari fails in 2004?
michelin improved their game from 2002 to 2003 no doubt but only in a few areas.
williams turned around because of a hugely improved aerodynamic package and suspension according to many.
when the fia,on instigation by ferrari,changed their measuring of tirewidths, michelin and williams jumped to say that tyre was in use since imola 2001 iirc.

I dont think it is fair to say the 2003GA only excelled in topspeed..since brasil 2002 it was clear bmw does not make the most powerfull F1 engines anymore, that is being taken back where it belongs: in marranello.

the 2003 ferrari had a longer wheelbase to make better use of some qualifying situations but with the scrapping of the normal 1 hour qualsession the extension was useless.where williams and toyota copied the shortwheelbase F2002 ferrari concept to the tiniest details, very obvious for most F1 fans, ferrari was stuck with a longwheelbase chassis.
the mclaren 17 is also longwheelbase and hence its uncompetative looks(despite all the stolen ferrari-desigh bits) in the same one lap qualifysession.

the only track where topspeed counts these days is monza but still the 2003 ga won 5 other times where williams and mclaren and renault simply failed.

so i dont think bridgestone is gonna be in any trouble and, like ferrari and shumi, they can afford to lose a few worldchampionship titles before people gonna say oo bridgestone sucks.. no way.. 6 straight constructorchampionships is a record to be proud of.

and despite mclaren building ferrari style gearbox, bmw style engine, minardi style nose and williams copying the f2002, i dont see them overtake ferrari next year.
even without the burden of building their own inhouse engine they will not succeed.

[Wrex]

Originally posted by mansellmania
before anyone here starts copying more useless F1 headlines from the tabloidlike autosport website i'd like to say michelins testform DOES NOT threaten ferrari, after all, testing means nothing.
and michelin needs 10000 laps before bridgestone even has to consider coming out of bed to try new wettyres.

willsomeonepleasebuythisman anewshiftkeyandspacebar

Sounds to me like BS have some work to do.

[BootsOntheSide]

Bridgestones only won Razil ebcause it was wet. They were also competitive in the wet at Indy.

In the dry they were terrible after their cheating was uncovered at Monaco.

McLaren's new car looks set to be extremely advanced and will rpobably be reliable from the word go. Raikkonen and Montoya are improving all the time, yet mcihael surely can't get any better. 2003 was the first time in years that Schumacher was making costly mistakes - Ferrari didn't always get the strategy right either. Losign BAR's support means that Ferrari could be swamped by stacks of ultra-competitive Michelin cars if Bridgestone have an off day.

By your logic, Goodyear shouln't've been dissapointed at losing the 1998 title, ebcause they'd already won it enough times. I'm not sure Bridgestone achieved much by winning the 2000 title when they were the only tyre manufacturer involved.

[Gt_R]

Funny... Michelins were deemed/assumed legal on this forum after pretty "convincing" situations, yet, Bridgestones were "uncovered" for "their cheating". ???

[DriverT]

Well, I personally think Michelin will be a threat, especially as McLaren were 2 seconds faster at the last test. True, test times don't mean much but when the driver speaks out about it, it means a little bit more.

[ASCII Man]

Originally posted by Gt_R
Funny... Michelins were deemed/assumed legal on this forum after pretty "convincing" situations, yet, Bridgestones were "uncovered" for "their cheating". ???

If the rules said: "Furthermore, the thread width of the front tyres must not exceed 270 mm at all times" then it would have been cheating.
But that was obviously not the case.



Now, send in your interpretations of those rules.
I would love to see 'em!

[Mr V]

Originally posted by mansellmania
my simple mathematics told me bridgestone still won both titles in 2003 and one engineer who remains anonymous says nothing. my grandmother couldv said that.

Simple mathmatics goes even further....

In 2002, in the best car/tyre combination F1 has ever seen Ferrari/Bridgestone won 15 out of 17 races

In 2003, Ferrari/Bridgestone won 8 out of 16 races

Sure, Williams, McLaren and Renault upped their game in 2003, but so did Michelin and it follows that they (teams and tyres) can only get better.

As alot of people on this site know, i have spoke about alot reliability or the lack of it when compairing Williams/McLaren with Ferrari and that imo cost either JPM or Kimi the WDC. Get the reliability right for 2004, Michelin keep things going the way they are and we will see a different WDC in 2004.

[Aysedasi]

Lets hope so, the sport needs it badly.

[krt917]

Originally posted by Mr V
Sure, Williams, McLaren and Renault upped their game in 2003, but so did Michelin and it follows that they (teams and tyres) can only get better.

Yes, isn't this the point. Noone questions the fact that Ferrari and Bridgestone have made a great partnership in the past, but it seems logical that Michelin will cause Ferrari problems because: a) they will be getting more data and, providing they don't go down too many different routes to please everyone, should produce a better tyre than Bridgestone; b) everyone stops winning eventually. Ferrari won the tile this year partly due to the quality of the car, partly due to Schuey and Bridgestone getting the job done when conditions got tough (or should that be wet!?) and because the challengers, especially Williams, weren't able to get it together for the whole year.

I rather suspect Ferrari and Michael will get beaten in 2004, but I disagree with Ayse's point about F1 'needing' change, This year was great and the fact that Ferrari won merely shows that they were able to raise their game.

[mansellmania]

Originally posted by Aysedasi
Lets hope so, the sport needs it badly.

well in a show i always wanna see different people win refrigerators but in a sport i only want the best to win, wether thats bcs the opposition left off or the winner made the least mistakes.


bootsontheside i was replying to neilap who claimed bridgestone need to up their dry weather spec.
its funny that when such a car as jordan wins a GP its suddenly never on merrit just bcs they share the same rubber as ferrari?

how about arrows in 97 hungary?

and no, goodyear have every reason to be proud and said long time in advance they would not continue in F1.

[ASCII Man]

Originally posted by mansellmania
... bcs ...

Hmm? :confused:
New tyre manufacturer?

[Knowlesy]

Testing means nuffin' huh?

Maybe it doesn't to you, but I think it is always a good indicator of things to come. Last year, at Melbourne, Williams, McLaren, Renault etc... all carried on where they left off in Winter testing in terms of outright pace.

Testing this year shows me that Williams haven't looked so prepared since 1997, McLaren are going to be mighty and Michelin are on top form. It will carry on like this in the season, I can assure you.

Bridgestone are in trouble. Just one frontline team to develop tyres, plus a midfield and the two worst teams. Michelin can call on Williams, McLaren, Renault, BAR, Jaguar and Toyota. And the Ferrari fans aren't worried about that? You should all be praying for a wet season!

mansellmania, you are in denial my friend!