Current Alfa Romeo Racing (formerly Sauber)

Sauber

FIA Entry: Sauber F1 Team
Car 16: Kamui Kobayashi
Car 17: Sergio Perez
Engine: Ferrari V8
Team Principal: Peter Sauber
Technical Director: James Key
Race Engineer Car 16: Francesco Nenci
Race Engineer Car 17:Marco Schupbach

Stats as of end 2010

First Entered 1993
Races Entered 296
Race Wins 1
Pole Positions 1
Fastest Laps 2
Driver World Championships 0
Constructor World Championships 0

The Beginning

Following success in sports car racing Peter Sauber, in collaboration with Mercedes Benz, moved into Formula 1 in 1993. With Ilmor engines Sauber entered the C12 car (the C prefix for Sauber cars coming from Peter Sauber’s wife Christine) driven by Mercedes sports car drivers JJ Lehto and Karl Wendlinger. Lehto finished a creditable 5th in their first race and the cars proved fast but unreliable. When the cars finished they often picked up points with Lehto managing 4th in San Marino and Wendlinger the same placing in Italy.

In 1994 the team became officially Sauber Mercedes as the Ilmor engines were rebadged as Mercedes units. Heinz Harald Frentzen replaced Lehto and the team showed similar pace to the previous season with a number of minor points placings. Wendlinger was replaced, following an accident at Monaco, firstly by Andrea de Cesaris and later in the season by Lehto. Wendlinger’s accident, following closely after the deaths of Senna and Ratzenberger at San Marino, resulted in changes to the design of the cockpit on F1 cars to provide greater head protection in the event of an accident.

Red Bull & Ford

1995 saw Mercedes leave Sauber to supply engines to McLaren. Now armed with Red Bull sponsorship, Red Bull owner Dietrich Mateschitz having bought a stake in the Sauber team, Sauber sourced Ford factory engines. Wendlinger hadn’t recovered well and was replaced early in the season by Jean Christophe Bouillon. Sauber amassed 18 points for the season with Frentzen taking a podium for 3rd in Belgium.

Jonny Herbert partnered Frentzen for 1996 and managed a highest of 3rd at Monaco, with Frentzen 4th, but the team ended the season on their lowest points tally since entering Formula 1 with 11 points

Ferrari Customer

From 1997 to 2005 Sauber used customer Ferrari engines and run under the name of title sponsor Petronas. The tie in with Ferrari extended beyond the supply of engines as Ferrari also provided the Swiss team with technical support.

Jonny Herbert continued with Sauber for 1997 and ’98 and was partnered in ’98 by veteran Jean Alesi. Herbert managed a podiums at Hungary in ’97 and Alesi in Belgium in ’98 but generally Sauber’s performance was fairly ordinary. In 2001 Sauber hired young Finnish driver Kimi Raikkonen amidst protest form other teams due to his lack of experience. Raikkonen scored a point on his debut with teammate Nick Heidfeld 4th in the same race. Raikkonen’s appointment also triggered the sale of Red Bull’s stake in Sauber to Credit Suisse as the Austrian drinks company wanted the seat given to Enrique Bernoldi.

Peter Sauber continued to give drives to promising youngsters with Felipe Massa racing for him in 2004 & 2005 and Robert Kubica replacing Jacques Villeneuve in 2006.

BMW Sauber

For 2006 BMW took a controlling interest in the Sauber team and BMW units replaced Ferrari engines. BMW “works” driver Nick Heidfeld returned to Sauber from Williams and the team finished 2nd in the Constructors Championship behind Ferrari (following the exclusion of the McLaren team). Heidfeld scored points in 14 of the 17 races that season. 2007 also saw the first F1 drive for Sebastien Vettel who substituted for Robert Kubica at the race in Indianapolis following the Pole’s crash in Canada.

2008 saw Sauber take their first Grand Prix win with Kubica victorious in Canada and Heidfeld coming home 2nd. The team scored numerous podiums and claimed 3rd spot in the Constructors Championship.

2009 was a disappointing season following the highs of 2008 as Sauber struggled with changes to design regulations. Heidfeld and Kubica both managed a 2nd place each but the team dropped to 6th in the Constructors Championship. By the end of the season BMW decided to pull out of the sport.

Back to Ferrari

Following BMW’s withdrawal Peter Sauber took back control of his team. Re-equipped with Ferrari engines Sauber signed promising young Japanese driver Kamui Kobayshi alongside returning veteran Pedro de la Rosa. Early season reliability problems blighted the team but by the end of the season, and the replacement of de la Rosa with Nick Heidfeld, Sauber began to score points on a regular basis. Kobayshi managed a highest finish of 6th in Britain and the team ended 8th in the Constructors Championship.

2011

Kobayashi stays with Sauber for 2011 alongside Sergio Perez who brings with him some much-needed sponsorship from Mexican Telecoms company Telmex. The C30 chassis continues with a Ferrari engine.

 

[HansyRod]

I don't follow GP2 and the other junior series closely, but isn't he supposed to be pretty good? Or at least, better than Ericsson and VDG put together... not to mention their current roster. (My phone just auto corrected "roster" to "disaster", haha )

 

[Brogan]

https://twitter.com/ClipTheApex/status/530495335832227843

 

[Il_leone]

Sutil may have a contract but seriously I don't think he will drive for the team - it is not like he's one of the most expensive drivers

i know Arrows fired Verstappen after Frentzen was available much to chagrin of Orange who sponsored the team because of Jos..this was after his seat was confirmed though

Many drivers have had their contracts terminated and paid off unless Sauber are planning for 3 cars and they want to play musical drivers which is bizarre it comes down to who brings the biggest $ and really it looks like Ericsson and Nasr do

 

[Il_leone]

it must be Sauber's lucky day as Marussia are gone and they get the prize money ! Probably going to be spent paying off Sutil

 

[cider_and_toast]

Call me Mr Cynical but you know what, maybe they took that into consideration over the last few days when they were drawing up their driver contracts. They are supposed to be getting a kick back from CVC for being good girlls and boys until the end of the season as well.

 

[Galahad]

He looked like a superstar in British F3, but his years in GP2 haven't boosted his credentials, that's true. I'd be very surprised if he isn't an upgrade on Gutierrez, though.

 

[RasputinLives]

I echo what Galahad says in that Nasr comes with great potential and a good rep but one that is slightly damaged by that fact that Jolyon Palmer not only beat him on the race track but also psychologicly too. Palmer really put some moves on him at times and Nasr spent a lot of time moaning about it on the radio and in interviews. During a podium interview Palmer told him that he needed to stop whining and grow a pair. Nasr went very quiet after that.

Nasr gets the last laugh though as he is sponsored by a huge Brazilian bank so gets an F1 seat. Despite being better than him consistently over the last 2 years Palmer is not backed by a bank and therefore isn't in F1.

 

[Il_leone]

RasputinLives

http://www.formula1.com/news/interviews/2014/12/16719.html

It helps when you've got money and you can outbid anyone to get the scraps at the back including better drivers

IF he crashes and flops we can accuse him of being a spoilt kid..if he succeeds then perhaps we might be looking at Brazil's next world champion

 

[RasputinLives]

So Marciello is the official Sauber reserve

http://www1.skysports.com/f1/news/1...ubers-test-and-reserve-driver-for-2015-season

I feel a Ericson out Marciello in campaign brewing from myself.

 

[Il_leone]

Not sure RasputinLives considering Ericson brings $15m to get the drive

 

[RasputinLives]

Wouldn't Marciello bring them Ferrari engines? More importantly though he'd bring talent which would probably equal results which in turn would bring money.

 

[siffert_fan]

http://www.planetf1.com/driver/18227/9632807/Sauber-trio-bringing-in-the-money

I read recently that William's 1996 budget, when they were the dominant team, was $40 million. Now, apparently, it takes two to three times that much just to be a backmarker.

 

[cider_and_toast]

Just to put that into a little bit more context. I have estimated that $40 million USD was around £30 million GBP in 1996 from rough historical records.

With inflation, in today's money, that figure is equal to round about £49 million pounds which at today's exchange rate is $74.5 million USD.

So Marrusia's estimated final liabilities are 4 times the entire budget for the 1996 world championship winning Williams team.

Of course F1 isn't too expensive Bernie. No problems here, nothing to see... move along.

 

[FB]

But with manufacturers such as Fiat, Mercedes, Renault, Honda etc. throwing money at the sport what do you expect? How much did BMW and Toyota piss down the drain before they had had enough?

 

[cider_and_toast]

Which surely proves that high spending doesn't equal high performance? Furthermore, because there is a perception that F1 is a rich sport it has got itself into a situation where sub-contractors must be gold plating the nuts and bolts.

In a situation not too different from NASA in the 60's, because sub-contractors supply F1 teams in a very narrow field, things such as ordinary nuts and bolts that would cost a few pence each, now cost a few pounds each.

Out of interest yesterday, I looked at the cost of an original Porsche 911. I found the price for a 1965 basic model 911 was 40 grand in today's money. The same car today costs 75 grand. Less than double the original costs. When you consider the rise in costs of materials (expensive alloys etc), wage rises and so on, I don't think that's to bad. Why then, in the same field of performance engineering has F1's costs grown more than 4 times greater in half the time?

To bring it back to Sauber, they've just gone through their poorest season in F1. How do they improve? Would spending 4 times more over the winter help or would it lead to a more expensive failure? They buy their engines so they get what they are given. To get that level of increased finance they would want pay drivers which could bring new sponsors. These sponsors would expect five star treatment at race weekends which would require more investment in sponsor and corperate facilities. Pay drivers ( I'm looking at you Chilton) rarely produce an increase in performance.

Surely the smaller teams need to spend what they have more effectively. I'm sure they would have already thought of this though. Ultimately if an F1 team builds a car that doesn't win races they have wasted their time. That's what they are all there to do and if that's not the case, they should pack up and go home. Does a multi functional sponsor friendly dream bus make the car go quicker? No. Does paying a person to stand next to your driver at a press conferance recording his every word, make the car go quicker? No. Does building the ultimate technology design-o-sphere team HQ, make the car go quicker? No. Finding and promoting talent. Designing a good car and making it go as fast as possible is what makes your car go quicker. This is what so many teams have lost sight of.

 

[FB]

I wonder if Sauber are still suffering a hangover fro their BMW ownership? BMW invested and improved the facilities in Hinwil but I doubt Peter Sauber can afford to keep all he has running and. perhaps, they focus in the wrong areas. Either that or Slasher and Kermit were just shit drivers.

 

[cider_and_toast]

Yeah, I think that could be part of it. Especially point two regarding their drivers

 

[Bill Boddy]

Sorry cider_and_toast but it is a little more difficult than that. I am sure that the teams use their money as effectively as they can. Not having press conferences would only save peanuts (and lose out on publicity), I haven't seen much about the big new headquarters buildings for Caterham and Marussia either.

As far as I remember the last new team entry to get to the position of winning a race was Stewart and he had enlisted Ford's aid before he started. Who was the new team before that?

There used to be room in the series that I watched for enthusiastic amateurs to get some money together to race a car for fun, normally by buying a chassis from another team and getting an engine at comparatively low cost. They didn't last (shut up about Williams) but they didn't leave debts the size of Marrusia's behind. This series was called Formula One.

 

[cider_and_toast]

Jordan did very well as a start up oufit.

The thing is Bill Boddy , Caterham etc aspire to have the big headquarters and the grandest team bus.

The days of the 60's style "Rob Walker" turn up and race are long long gone. If you flash forward to the 80's and 90's though, look how many teams climbed up a step from F3000 and sports cars. Sauber being one of them. There were various levels of success and some lasted longer than others. That path has also been effectively blocked.

My argument is that because there is an expectation that you have to spend to race then it becomes a self fullfilling prophecy.

 

[RasputinLives]

You make a very good point cider_and_toast regarding the teams climbing up the ladder no longer being able to do that. If you think that DAMS have pretty much dominated at every level of single seater racing other than F1 and have never been inclined to try and get into F1 then you have to admitt there is a problem.

DAMS know they won't succeed and they'll go bust in the process even with all their Renault connections and multi-talent employees. If they don't think they can do it then why on earth should anyone with any sense of what motor racing is all about ever think they can? Hence a lack of teams on the grid.