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.
 
Really? I think the its the drivers making the car look good
In the 29 races of the pairing so far, both drivers have finished in the points together only 5 times (including their 2011 Melbourne disqualification), and just 3 times this season.

They've struggled to get into Q3 lately despite the car still showing good pace in races. The team believes the car to be quick everywhere and should have been scoring more points, but the first time this season both drivers genuinely performed well together (aside from qualifying) was Germany.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/101165
 
I have to say I share Viscount's position on this. Not to the same extent as Williams, but they seem to have become stuck in a rut on strategy, and the drivers appear to be taking turns to have a decent weekend. They could have more points.
 
Both Kobayashi and Perez feel they could be doing better:

Kamui Kobayashi: “Overall we have done a good job and achieved great things. The team built a very good car with an excellent performance. Since the beginning of the season we have been competitive on most tracks, and this means we can be confident for the remainder of the season. The downside so far has been we definitely missed some opportunities for some more great results. Too often we didn’t manage the weekend perfectly. If we can improve there, a lot will be possible.”

Sergio Pérez: “I had some great moments in the first half of the season. There were the two podiums in Malaysia and Montreal, which, of course, made me very happy. Nevertheless it was also a period with ups and downs because we didn’t make the most of every situation.”

http://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/s...rst-half-of-season-before-their-summer-break/
 
I guess it depends on how you look at it.

Kobi has 5 points finishes this season, has already beaten his points total from both the previous seasons and scored his best result ever with a 4th in Germany. Perez has over tripple the amount of points he managed to score in his rookie season already, 2 podiums out of 5 points finishes not to mention three 11th places where he's just missed out. All this is one is suppose to be one of the tightest fields in F1 in a car that most people would rank the 6th if not 7th best car on the grid. By there own standards and even by Sauber standards both drivers are having amazing seasons but I do take your point regarding the fact that maybe the car is better than the performance they are putting in. I do think the Williams comparrison is unfair though as both drivers are doing far better than the Williams pairing.

I think it comes down to experience and mentality if I'm honest I don't think Perez or Kobi have ever had a car this good or expected to have a car this good and this has lead to a lot of nerves and mistakes this year. Certainly where Perz is concerned we've seen him get involved in accidents and make mistakes when he realizes how good a chance he has. I also think Sauber still think like a little team and usually split the strategies and try something different hoping to sneak points. Works great as a small team but with a pacey car it leaves one of their drivers fighting an uphill battle. Maybe both of them need to gain more confidence to turn round to the team and say no we're not doing that today. But I guess thats hard to do when previous experience shows it gets results.
 
:goodday: Hats off to Sauber and Perez today. Great drive, great teamwork and clever strategy. They seem to be making steady incremental progress both in development and the strategy which appears to be continually refined around using the Pirelli's durability and characteristics.:2nd:
 
Indeed. Not forgetting their 2nd in Malaysia after knocking on the door of the top step. If they can keep the thing on the tarmac, reliability and staying out of trouble wise, I think they'll be showing well at Singapore as well.
 
Well done to them, but I don't know about tactical brilliance - they just do the opposite of everyone else. Half the time it works, but half the time it doesn't, and they've had some disappointing races. I wonder if there's a lot more potential in that package to be unlocked - we shouldn't forget they're running on a tiny budget.
 
I'm going to refrain from using the word package in my posts in future...

Apparently Helmut Marko said he thought the Sauber was the best car out there. That seems patently not the case, but it might be better than the championship position suggests. Mercedes in particular have benefitted this season from fluctuations in Sauber and Williams form - some seems attributable to the cars, some to the drivers.
 
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