F1 2016 Season: Lineup's - Rumours - News

Dirty way for them to treat a driver imo. They kid has just turned 22 and they're effectively tossing him on the scrap heap.

 

Saying that you'd expect those teams to honor those contracts rather than flinging a driver out for a couple of bad races. They've potentially just killed his career.

 

Once again, he hasn't been fired, he's been put into the reserve side to get a bit more race craft without threatening his team-mate, whose race was badly compromised by Kvyats driving. Last race he caused two team-mates to collide, this time his own was amongst the casualties, Vettel had Kyat as an excuse, Kyat has none for either Russian accident.
also RBR have promoted the most exciting driver in years into one of the better cars. Verstappen in a RBR could be a threat to the front runners, Kyat isn't at the moment. Was I mistaken in thinking I people wanted a challenge at the front?

 

Sorry was in a hurry and wasn't clear, I meant, what would the contract between Wehrlein and Manor say?

Wehrlein has a contract with Merc, it says that they pay him and in return they expect him to do a certain number of things including promo days, testing, be available to drive, keep himself fit etc.

Manor have a contract with Merc, saying Merc will give them something, money, tech support, parts etc in return for putting Wehrlein in the car for a certain number of sessions, races etc.

So what does Wehrlein's contract with Manor say, what is the agreement between them, what is the consideration (value exchange) that is used to validate of the agreement?

A lot people in this thread seem to believe that RedBull owe Kvyat something. I can tell you for sure they don't, his contract won't make any guarantees about time in a RedBull seat and if I'm wrong we'll quickly find out because Kvyat will sue.


On a slightly different topic this is F1, it's the pinnacle of Motorsport, it should be tough and clearly hasn't been tough enough recently. If a 22 year old, or younger football player gets dumped back to the reserves after a bad performance, it's not unusual. Most F1 teams don't have that option, so it's more rare in this context, but as with all team sports the team has to come first.

 

It's a crappy way to deal with this situation 4 races in. Being sent to the reserves is usually the first step to seeing the door. What are they going to do if Verstappen has a howler? Send him to the naughty step too?

 

Has anyone on here said he has been sacked? You seem to be making the point a lot.

See, what RBR nned to do, is take a relatively inexperienced 22 year old who has finished on the podium this year and had one bad race, and replace him with an 18 year old, who has just one season of F1 under his belt and is more likely to cause an accident than anyone else.

can you see the likes of Hamilton, Vettel, Kimi etc jumping out of his way in the same manner the mid-grid drivers did last year when he made his lunging overtakes? yes they were great to watch, but he tries that on one of the lead drivers and it will be a big accident.

4 races in is ridiculous to replace a driver without it being for financial reasons. Yes, many drivers have been replaced part way through a season, but rarely before the half way mark.

Helmut and Christian have cuddled up to Vettel on this one. Had it been any other driver who was caught up in the last two races I doubt they would have cared If just the odd crashing and causing racing incidents (Kvyat was not penalised for China nor did he hit anyone) is enough for RBR to displace someone, Max would have been put back in F3 several times last year.

 

F1 penalty points table (as of May 6, 2016)
Points Driver Next points dropped
8 Max Verstappen May 24 (2 points)
5 Daniil Kvyat July 26 (2 points)
4 Romain Grosjean June 7 (2 points)
4 Marcus Ericsson June 21 (2 points)
4 Valtteri Bottas November 13 (2 points)
4 Nico Hulkenberg September 20 (2 points)
3 Sebastian Vettel June 6 (3 points)
3 Kimi Raikkonen October 11 (3 points)
2 Lewis Hamilton July 26 (2 points)
2 Felipe Nasr November 14 (2 points)
2 Fernando Alonso November 29 (2 points)
2 Rio Haryanto March 19 (2 points)
2 Esteban Gutierrez May 1 (2 points)
2 Carlos Sainz May 1 (2 points)
0 Eight drivers (Rosberg, Ricciardo, Perez, Massa, Button, Magnussen, Palmer, Wehrlein)

 

Hamilton wouldn't, he doesn't give anyone room, he generally tries to chop them across the nose, as for Vettel, if he'd held his line in china then 10 or more cars would've been crashed rather than just 5, and Kvyat would've been completely to blame.

'Horner and Vettel ahave cuddled up." LOL, the BBC is full of such moronic and poorly thought through statements. I'm sure Vettel wishes he really did have the power to decide on RBR's driver line up, he didn;t while he was there, but now he's a direct competitor they bow to every whim?
the reason it's been done is because Verstappen is better than Kvyat, hands down, and everyone, including you, knows it and RBR want to finish as high up the table as they can, and Verstappen will help that more than Kvyat. Now the big teams have started sniffing around Max. Kvyat, on the other hand, shows promise but is erratic and has caused 3 big accidents in 2 races, the last 2 were easily avoidable and included taking out his own team-mate. His good result has come because people in faster cars have had issues (mainly caused by Kvyat's driving). RBR want to beat Ferrari to 2nd, and they desperately want to keep Verstappen in the RBR stable and Kvyat's Grosjean-esque gave them the excuse to put their 2 fastest driver in their best team.

I think the real issue here is:
Seb Vettel/RBR 4x WDC

 

Verstappen is quick, no doubt, but is he ready for RBR after just one season in which he showed speed, eraticness and the ability to crash as well? A lot of pressure on an 18 year old who has shown himself to be very head strong and petulant already.

If he doesn't perform, do RBR them stick him on the rubbish pile as well? RIC has done well because he had the chance to ply his trade for a couple of seasons first down the grid outside of the glare of the front of the grid. If there is concern that Kvyat can't handle the pressure (which he didn;t show at all last year when he out scored RIC), why do they think Verstappen will do any better? To finish first, first you have to finish (copyright M.Walker)

 

They don't know if he will, but he certainly looks like he will, his pace and performances are stronger than Kvyats. Toro Rosso is all about finding future champions for RBR, it's about the package, not one part of it, if it were purely about results then Kvyat (scored 8 points in '14 for STR) would be partnered with Verstappen in STR and JEV (scored 22 points in '14 for STR) alongside DR in the RBR., but they already knew JEV didn;t have the mental strength to be a champion.
The plan was for DR and SV to be in the RBR and DK & MV in the STR, SV changed all that when he left for Ferrari. Kvyat got bumped up a year early, and, quite frankly, he's performing adequately. his 3rd place is way out of context when you see that 4 or five cars that were faster all had extra pit stops for damage. Adequate is simply not enough if you want to be a champion.
This decision has nothing to do with Vettel and all to do with beating Ferrari to 2nd and keeping Verstappen in the RBR stable, the added bonus is they get to see if Kvyat has the mental strength to cope with it, they don't want someone who will wilt like Webber, they want champs, not chumps.
I like Kvyat, I hope he passes the test, but Sainz is no slouch and it won;t be easy to regain his seat, but he is being given the chance to, rather than being booted out and replaced by the next young gun. It'll make or break him.

edit: ricciardo is winning Q 4-0, Kvyat is equal on 2-2 wih both STR drivers, and his Q times are all closer to the STR's than to Ricciardo.

 

If Verstappen does have a period where he struggles, will Red Bull keep faith with him or just move him through the revolving door of their driver program and bring in their next hope?

Don't get me wrong, I think it great what Red Bull do in trying to find and develop young drivers, but when they're fast tracked in to F1 and don't immediately shine, it doesn't take long for them to be out.

Verstappen could be a future star, but he could also see his F1 career done before he even hits 21 if Red Bull aren't willing to let him develop correctly.

 

nearly every driver in the Redbull program gets 2 years, the only 2 that havn't are Scott Speed and Sebastien Bourdais, who both got a season and a half, Kvyat is into his third. His career is as over as Grosjeans was in 2009.

 

I guess so... but if you look at the drivers they've run through, without the talent of Vettel they whole program would look like a bit of a failure tbh.

 

I'm with the naysayers with respect to, "this may not solve the problem, because one erratic, inexperienced, over promoted driver is being replaced by another".

All the other arguments of not honouring contracts (not true), it's only been 4 races (24 -42 actually depending on how you look at it), it's not fair (it's a lot fairer than some have been treated), Vettel influences the RBR line up (seriously?), are myopic, agenda driven nonsense.

 

My point was how can two teams that are supposedly separate entities suddenly swap two drivers. The assumption being that those drivers have separate contracts with those teams. Probably not getting my point across properly on this one. I find myself dipping in and out in between work lately. Busy times!

As for the whole Vettel bit... I don't see how he'd have any sway over what Red Bull do or why they'd particularly care. He's a Ferrari driver now.

 

No problem, I think the problem here is that your assumption is wrong - Red Bull have all their drivers on "central contracts" they then loan drivers to Torro Rosso.

 

Regardless of how the contracts are written up it wouldn't be a problem for them to switch drivers. If they're on central contracts then it's obviously easy. If not they possibly have a break clause in Kvyat's contract, and even then he won't be getting paid much so they could easily afford to buy him out and leave him without a drive or the option to drive for Toro Rosso, obviously he'd sign that contract. And Verstappen obviously would have no complaints with his contract being terminated and replaced with an RBR one. Regardless of how Red Bull had them written up, contracts were never going to be a barrier they couldn't overcome here.

What was shown of Vettel and Horner? I've only seen a short clip on YouTube. The guy seems to have serious influence in the sport, whether his actions had any impact on what happened after we'll never know, but to hear Horner talking about him sometimes you'd think he was still a Red Bull driver. He's the complete opposite of Alonso who seems to burn bridges and make enemies everywhere he goes. I can remember Alonso in Japan a couple of years ago trying to convince the world that he was the key to the driver market, no chance, that was all happening on Vettel's terms in my opinion.

 

The importance of understanding the contract situation is because we've had two days of unfounded RB bashing based on incorrect assumptions.

No-one in their right mind can surely think Vettel has had a significant influence here, but it's no suprise that Vettel's got a good relationship with his old team and others up and down the pit lane.

 

I disagree with the first statement, no one's bashing RB because of the way they treat their drivers contractually, but the way they treat them as people, or fail to treat them as people.

I don't know what was said between the Horner and Vettel, and I don't think Vettel wanted Kvyat to be sacked, but I think his criticism while venting at Horner would've stuck in Horner's mind and had some influence on the decision, if only subconsciously. Obviously Vettel has no say in the decision making process, and they'd never have brought his opinions up while discussing it, but what he said probably had some influence on Horner's stance when it was being discussed internally. Like others, I'm of the opinion that Red Bull have been considering this for a while, I imagine Marko wanted Verstappen to be in that car four races ago whilst Horner probably wanted an unchanged lineup (when has he ever sacked a driver?).

 

Post 857 - "he's been fired! This is why people don't like Red Bull." Is a direct attack based on a false statement about his contract being terminated. I like the way that it says "people don't like Red Bull because of stuff that's untrue", though!

Post 856, 858 and several others following on, this method of contracting is unacceptable, needs exposing etc.

To be fair Sgt has said he made a false assumption and some have jumped on that, unfortunately.

Once again this is the supposed pinnacle of Motorsport. Perform and we treat you we'll, don't and accept the consequences is not unusual for elite level sport.