2011-12 Silly Season
Re: 2011-12 Silly Season
Charles Pic and Giedo van der Garde have entered the frame for seats at Renault: Pic’s family business GCA Trans is the primary transport company for Total and has a fleet of 7,000 trucks that need replacing from time to time. The firm tends to buy hundreds of trucks each year from companies such as Renault. Van der Garde because Dutch media claims that his father is looking at buying a stake in the team. Van der Garde is really running out of time, Pic has possibly another season or two to make the grade
Jean Eric Vergne is testing for STR on Friday's from Korea, so he might be looking good for an STR seat - perhaps Buemi & Alguersuari will be dropped in favour of Ricciardo & Vergne?
Jean Eric Vergne is testing for STR on Friday's from Korea, so he might be looking good for an STR seat - perhaps Buemi & Alguersuari will be dropped in favour of Ricciardo & Vergne?
Re: 2011-12 Silly Season
Can't see Buemi being at STR next year, and as for Alguersuari, I reckon he'll get one more year. Ricciardo I expect will take Buemi's slot with Vergne taking Ricciardo's HRT slot.
Re: 2011-12 Silly Season
Felipe Nasr (British F3 leader) has been offered a 2012 McLaren young driver contract, he is waiting on Ferrari though.
Another rumour is that Heikki Kovalainen is trying to increase his salary from €3m to €5m although Team Lotus aren't ready to do this. Negotiations are ongoing and are likely to see Heikki remain, although Razia and Grosjean wait in the wings
Jarno Trulli says he is not negotiating with Team Lotus - because he already has a deal
Marcel Boekhoorn - wiki page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Boekhoorn - is, according to De Telegraaf, interested in buying Renault from Genii Capital (who has a 75% stake in 'Renault'). If that goes ahead, his son-in-law, Giedo Van der Garde, will be at Renault.
Another rumour is that Heikki Kovalainen is trying to increase his salary from €3m to €5m although Team Lotus aren't ready to do this. Negotiations are ongoing and are likely to see Heikki remain, although Razia and Grosjean wait in the wings
Jarno Trulli says he is not negotiating with Team Lotus - because he already has a deal
Marcel Boekhoorn - wiki page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcel_Boekhoorn - is, according to De Telegraaf, interested in buying Renault from Genii Capital (who has a 75% stake in 'Renault'). If that goes ahead, his son-in-law, Giedo Van der Garde, will be at Renault.
Re: 2011-12 Silly Season
Whitmarsh said that Button will be a McLaren driver next season :
From JA's blog :I can guarantee you that he will be with us next year. We both want to work together for a long period of time. It’s a non-issue.
Adam cooper posted the following tweet last month :The situation as I understand it is that the team has an option on him for next season. Both sides want a longer deal than that, perhaps two or three years, but Button wants to be paid a sum more closely aligned to his team mate Lewis Hamilton, who signed a long-term deal in the pre-credit crunch days.
An ex-McLaren driver told me the team 'can't afford to keep Jenson because they pay Lewis so much.' Make of that what you will...
Re: 2011-12 Silly Season
Sam Michael confirmed at Mclaren
http://www.f1zone.net/news/williams-f1- ... aren/8888/
http://www.f1zone.net/news/williams-f1- ... aren/8888/
Re: 2011-12 Silly Season
Interesting that Mclaren are keeping him away from the design department.
Re: 2011-12 Silly Season
http://www.f1zone.net/news/renault-coul ... 2012/8916/It is possible both Robert Kubica and Vitaly Petrov will not feature in next year’s Renault team lineup.
Re: 2011-12 Silly Season
Wonder where Kubica would go !?
Re: 2011-12 Silly Season
According to Finnish F1 news the visit was just confirmed by a Williams representative. They said it was a "private visit" and they would not comment further.
http://www.mtv3.fi/urheilu/f1/uutiset.s ... vistettiin
Kimi has always said he'll return with a competitive car only maybe the visit has a relationship with the Jaguar / Williams Le Mans project for 2014-2015?
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Rumors say Rosberg had an offer from Mercedes till 2015 for $40 million
http://www.mtv3.fi/urheilu/f1/uutiset.s ... vistettiin
Kimi has always said he'll return with a competitive car only maybe the visit has a relationship with the Jaguar / Williams Le Mans project for 2014-2015?
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Rumors say Rosberg had an offer from Mercedes till 2015 for $40 million
Re: 2011-12 Silly Season
I can't see it personally. Sure, it'd be great for F1 but honestly. Kimi going to the 9th best team when he turned down McLaren and Mercedes at the end of 2009?
What's more, Williams is being run as a business venture with the actual racing aspect second to this. They have the Renault engines coming, plus a new design team, but the problem is the other teams are making progress too.
Williams can't catch the top 5 next season. Perhaps get close to the mess that is Renault, but unlikely. Force India continue to make strides, whilst STR will soon have huge Middle Eastern money. Sauber getting a lot of money from Slim helps, plus they have great foundations at Hinwil plus some BMW resources too.
Would Raikkonen really want to go to a team that has a best result of two 9th places this season, who won't pay the salary he demanded from McLaren/Toyota/Mercedes during the second half of 2009?
He would be better off establishing himself in NASCAR, or focusing more on WRC. Hell, even Sports car racing such as LMP1. Because he'd be a liability coming back to Williams too. Problem with WRC is that it's in a crippling state, so options are very limited. Is there the affordibility to continue?
Coming back with Williams might be sensible though (just to EJ everyone, hurr). Because if he can prove he's still fast, then when there's a Ferrari (okay, almost impossible), two McLaren, one Red Bull and several other seats available for 2013, he could still be top drawer.
What's more, Williams is being run as a business venture with the actual racing aspect second to this. They have the Renault engines coming, plus a new design team, but the problem is the other teams are making progress too.
Williams can't catch the top 5 next season. Perhaps get close to the mess that is Renault, but unlikely. Force India continue to make strides, whilst STR will soon have huge Middle Eastern money. Sauber getting a lot of money from Slim helps, plus they have great foundations at Hinwil plus some BMW resources too.
Would Raikkonen really want to go to a team that has a best result of two 9th places this season, who won't pay the salary he demanded from McLaren/Toyota/Mercedes during the second half of 2009?
He would be better off establishing himself in NASCAR, or focusing more on WRC. Hell, even Sports car racing such as LMP1. Because he'd be a liability coming back to Williams too. Problem with WRC is that it's in a crippling state, so options are very limited. Is there the affordibility to continue?
Coming back with Williams might be sensible though (just to EJ everyone, hurr). Because if he can prove he's still fast, then when there's a Ferrari (okay, almost impossible), two McLaren, one Red Bull and several other seats available for 2013, he could still be top drawer.
Re: 2011-12 Silly Season
We can see how it's diffucult for even experienced drivers to acquintance themselves to F1 when they aren't racing during a whole season. It will be third season Kimi Raikkonen haven't driven an F1 car, just like Schumi. Hence the diffuculties. So he could use Williams as a leverage to come to terms with F1 while Williams use him as a marketing tool. Highly unlikely but still.phil1993 wrote: Coming back with Williams might be sensible though (just to EJ everyone, hurr). Because if he can prove he's still fast, then when there's a Ferrari (okay, almost impossible), two McLaren, one Red Bull and several other seats available for 2013, he could still be top drawer.
"I don't want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve it by not dying" -Woody Allen
Re: 2011-12 Silly Season
The thing is that Raikkonen will be 32 (the same age as Button) at the start of 2012. Schumacher was 41 when he made his comeback: big difference. Plus, Schumacher was going off the boil towards the end of 2004 as you could see his driving wasn't as imperious in 2005 or 2006. The big crucial point though is the tyres, they've made Webber useless this year and he was brilliant in 2010. Kimi has no knowledge of them.