There have been media reposts a deal has been reached which would bring Valterri Bottas to Maranello to replace Kimi Raikkonen. The deal would see Ferrari paying Williams a rather astounding €12 Million / $13 Million to Williams for the remainder of the Finn's contract.
While there has been some disappointment over Raikkonen's inconsistency, the idea Ferrari would give a direct rival a similar cash injection is odd.
Raikkonen would likely have been offered a one year contract, Bottas has one year left in his contract with Williams. There are big rule changes on the horizon for 2017.
Why not wait one more season with Kimi and get Bottas at a 12 million discount?
It's possible Raikkonen is not willing to accept a 1 year contract, forcing Ferrari's hand. Also it's quite possible Bottas would agree to drive for Ferrari for a nominal sum in the first year.
Bottas has been out shined, in the most recent races, by Massa a driver Ferrari cut and having this Finn rather than the current one will not get Ferrari any closer to Mercedes.
On the plus side Bottas has shown to be consistent and drama free, two qualities that would fit well in the long term plan to take the Scuderia back to the top of the sport. Today,
More worrying for the future of the red team is the yet unsigned contract renewal with James Allison. Allison is one of the top men in the sport whose beneficial influence on the Scuderia since his return is undeniable .
He has yet to design a car from scratch, the 2015 car is a compromise necessitated by lack of resources: time and some say, financial commitment. 2016 will be his car.
But the top brass at FCA is unhappy despite this year's improvements. Perhaps some in the boardroom are dreaming of landing Adrian Newey for the full out attack in 2017. Perhaps it's a pressure tactic.
What it looks like from the outside is that Ferrari is panicking rather than working methodically as Mercedes did.
Odd because Marchionne has been clever in pushing through the development freeze loophole this past off season. It allowed Ferrari to make significant gains in engine power after the initial engine compromise, slave to a design philosophy which put a premium on aero efficiency with smaller radiators which in turn meant less power could be extracted from the Power Unit, at significant deficit.
Other silly season rumors, contingent on Bottas' joining Ferrari, have Nasr bringing his €18M sponsorship to Williams the €30M windfall next year more than making up for the comic confusion any future "Feleipe is faster than you " message tha might come up
Nasr's seat at Sauber would be filled by Ferrari reserve Gutierrez.
Hulkenberg remains the odd man out with no top team interested. James Allen wrote today:"Detailed analysis of his on track performance data by the engineers, which Williams management will be studying now, as all the teams do, shows that while he has his moments of magic, he’s not at the level of a Bottas or a Ricciardo"
Hulkenberg could stay at Force India or join Haas.All this is contingent on what happens with Kimi. It's important to realize this talk has been driven by some in the Italian media who have decided Raikkonen must go now.
Ferrari for their part are denying as you might expect they would but I would not necessarily stick a fork in Kimi yet.
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Maybe it's Kimi who's agitating for the change. Obviously he's even less helpful than other drivers in interviews on the topic, but he's said things that to my mind indicate he's definitely been looking for something else to do. As for Hulkenberg, he's got these other options now. Not as lucrative as an F1 drive, but then again endurance racing doesn't have this constant downward pressure from the big teams screwing with the driver market.
ReplyDeleteAaaand Button. There's a lot of talk about the symbolism of returning to Williams in what would almost certainly be his last big move...but then again,why would he walk away from Macca and Honda after putting up with all the BS this year? Unless there's something seriously wrong happening behind the scenes, which could well be the case, JB is patient enough to see the potential. It's an easy call from the outside - he's likely to bail if these rumors are true - but then again, he saw the whole Brawn mess playing out pretty well and didn't jump ship when everyone, including myself, had written off that team entirely before the season had even begun.
Makes you think that Seb squashed the idea of waiting for Ricciardo to be contract free in 2017, doesn't it?
ReplyDeletei don't think they are thinking just about financial aspect alone, they are thinking more about investing in younger talent, wats the point of paying kimi one more year if hes not going to challenge vettel and from looks of it settled for place behind vettel.
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