Manor (formerly Marussia)

KMag, anyone?

Magnussen was hanging around Renault with their Venezuelan debt collector earlier this year.

Seen on sky sports news that Pascal Wehrlein has signed for Manor Mercedes. Not the biggest surprise because it was an educated guess that Wehrlein would be part of 2016 engine deal but even still. Great signing for Manor Racing could be good as has great potential if those hes a double dtm champion

I'm wondering how much longer the Mercedes / Williams tie up will go on for? I would expect we will start hearing rumours of a Williams / Honda deal allowing Manor to become the Mercedes equivalent of Toro Rosso. That was something which I'm sure Toto had hoped Williams would become but the Mercedes match up with Manor makes that far easier, less of a threat to Mercedes position and more manageable within the company.

I have my reservations about Werhlein seeing basically he competed in a series where all the other Mercedes cars decided to act as rear gunners for him to win the title which did not go down with Audi and BMW that Mercedes were committed to open racing

Werhlein moving to Manor means an opportunity for Alex Lynn at Williams as both their drivers are out of contract but he will probably have to fight Nasr for the seat


The other Manor seat is between Haryanto or Rossi I feel

It does feel like another step towards Manor becoming the Mercedes B team. I wonder if he came with the engine deal?
I'm quite excited to see how he goes though. I'd like to see him partnered with Rossi. We know he's pretty good.

I think Manor ought to beat Sauber this season and may battle Toro Rosso as well . Force India might just be out of touch though

Toto believes Manor will be a midfield team this coming seaon..........

9:44 – Mercedes boss Toto Wolff says Manor Racing should make a substantial step forwards in 2016 and emerge as a "solid midfield" contender.

Manor has never finished higher than ninth in the Constructors' Championship, a result it achieved in 2014 courtesy of two points scored by Jules Bianchi in Monaco, its only top 10 result in six years of competition.

However, Manor will introduce a new car, the MRT05, has acquired current-year Mercedes engines, has developed a Williams technical partnership and signed Pascal Wehrlein as its first driver.

Wolff believes Manor has the ability and the resources to make significant progress in 2016.

"Manor will make a big step up and not only because of the engine but there is a good bunch of people coming together," he said.

"[They are] impressive individuals, with the right budget and the right attitude, and [have] Pascal in the car, so I have confidence that the car and the driver will have highlights and could be a solid midfield runner."

Wolff also expects a resurgence in form from McLaren-Honda, which languished towards the back of the midfield in 2015 during a troubled reunion year.

"Honda is a huge company with lots of resources, they [had] the power unit which had the most impressive development curve throughout 2015, even if it was a very difficult year for them," he explained.

"It was still very good what they achieved in terms of ow they progressed, I have no doubt they will be a strong competitor in the future."

In 2015 Manor were further off Sauber than Sauber were off Mercedes. If Manor is anywhere other than at the back with Haas I will be very surprised.

In 2015 Manor ran there 2014 car with the 2014 Ferrari engine because they had to stop working on the 2015 car due to their financial problems. Once back on their feet they made the decision to work all last year on the 2016 car rather than bring in the 15.

The buzz was that the 2015 car was looking pretty good and if they'd had the new Ferrari engine they would have certainly give the Saubers a run for their money so this new machine might surprise you. Sometimes you need to step away from the stats and look at life.

Also given the fact that Ferrari were using the building of the Haas car last year to develop their 2015 car (for legal purposes this is all speculation guv!) Then Haas might surprise you too.

Hass are predicting second quali at Australia and are targeting points. They also told the Sky Sports team that their chassis is better than the Ferrari chassis. There's confidence for you. It's going to be busy in the midfield.

Manor were using a year-old chassis and engine yes but Sauber themselves barely updated their chassis and in any case we are talking about an average deficit to Sauber of around 4% per lap in 2015. To put it in perspective Sauber themselves were 'only' 2.6% off Mercedes. In 2014 Manor were about 1.7% off Sauber.
Even closing a 1.7% gap would be an enormous ask given the two teams should have roughly equal engines and Sauber has a bigger budget, so unless the 2016 Mercedes engine is amazing or Sauber completely screw up I just don't see Manor getting close.

Sauber aren't exactly showing signs of greatness by missing the first test, though. 1.7% isn't a huge amount to make up if you've got an extra year on it. If they've got it right they'll make the step into midfield. I still don't think it's too controversial to say the Mercedes engine is better than the Ferrari, either.

The problem with doing it on percentages like that is that it doesn't take into account that it's easier to make larger strides when you further behind because there is more to gain in the first place.

Also by that sort of thinking you've sunk another team called Mclaren. They have a smaller budget than Merc and a worse engine therefore they should be even further behind Merc than last year.

I saw somewhere on the interwebz today that Manor may well run three different drivers in their second seat during the season. Rossi, Stevens and Haryanto. Found the link: Inautonews - Three drivers to share second Manor seat – report

I think that shows who ever has the money will get the drive.

What is the rule on driver changes currently ?

I can why Manor are doing it because they need the money but don't do what Sauber did in signing drivers on legal contracts and then want to get rid of them having taken the money

It would be interesting to see if they all get equal chances to shine. I suspect that Rossi will do The American legs for the team , Ryo will do the Asian legs and Stevens the European races

Like it says in the article?

Well, there's an interesting concept. Bloody daft, but interesting nonetheless.

well teabagyokel Its daft but it helps maximise the team's opportunities doing this way to get sponsors and it is not as daft as signing drivers to bring in money to the team and then tell them to clear off and take their money when you sign someone else with more money.

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The daft thing about it is who is going to be leading in the engineers in the car set up and direction which might be confusing .. it basically means Werhlein is unofficially the No 1 in the team

It would be interesting to see if the three of them would share information and set up data to improve their car and work against Werhlein or they would rather keep the data to themselves and screw each other as well

Stevens is out Haryanyo has the seat.
He brings a reported £10mil to the team.
Inautonews - Haryanto to replace Stevens at Manor – reports