Horner on Hamilton to RB

sportsman

Sidecar racers have the biggest cojones
Contributor
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/formula_one/14044579.stm
Red Bull team principal Christian Horner does not believe a move for Lewis Hamilton would suit his team.
McLaren's Hamilton, 26, has been linked with a switch to Red Bull in the build-up to Sunday's British Grand Prix.
But Horner finds it "difficult to envisage" Hamilton and Red Bull's world champion Sebastian Vettel would work as a partnership.
"History dictates that two world-class drivers in the same team has not always been the best pairing," Horner said.
"You only have to think of Senna-Prost, Piquet-Mansell, or even Alonso and Hamilton.
"We are hugely happy to have Sebastian committed to the team long term, and with Mark [Webber], we're very pleased with the job he is doing.
But Horner was keen to pour cold water on any idea of Red Bull signing fellow Englishman Hamilton.
"I think it would be difficult to envisage a driver of Sebastian's calibre and that of Lewis under the same roof," Horner added.
"Lewis is a wonderful driver and you can understand why he might want to drive a Red Bull. It's obvious.
"But would it be the best thing for us? We have severe reservations it would be."
 
That's more or less saying 'Yes we have a number 1 and number 2 driver policy' right there, in spite of all the protestations last year then.

Thats not saying they have a #1 and #2 policy in the sense of one driver gets favoured, it is a #1 and #2 policy in the sense that they have one driver who they expect to challenge for the title and another who isn't.

And that nearly blew up last year, too!
 
So you have two team mates taking points of each other and a third driver from a rival leam nicks the wdc.
 
What else is Horner going to say? Yes, we'd love to have Lewis next year! Obviously he could never say that.

If Red Bull continued to dominate next year, there would be absolutely no fears whatsoever of an outsider collecting the WDC because Hamilton and Vettel were too busy squabbling with each other. It would be a two horse race and the championship would be massively exciting.

Is there anything that people would rather see than Seb v Lewis on equal footing. Hell, I enjoy some of their Euro F3 battles as much as anything I've seen in any form of motorsport.

Having said that, I just can't see RBR employing Hamilton anytime soon. They've got their guy, why would they want to bring somebody in that could beat him.
 
Two things spring to mind reading Horner's comments:

1) Horner does not consider his own driver (Webber) to be "world class". He indirectly makes it clear he considers one of his driver to be world class but not the other, and he doesn't seem to realise making this public isn't precisely likely to confirm to Mark that he is being treated equally within the team.
So that'll have to go down as the latest in a seemingly never-ending list of PR blunders by Christian...

2) Mansell was certainly not seen as £world-class at the time Piquet joined Williams.
 
1) Horner does not consider his own driver (Webber) to be "world class".

Outside of Australia does anybody consider Webber to be in the Vettel-Hamilton-Alonso-Button class? I don't think this is a closely guarded secret.

When one driver wins 6 of 8, and the other guy hasn't led a lap in the same car, you've got a massive speed discrepancy.

To me, Webber is a broken man. He had a great chance to win the title last year, blew it, and he knows he will never have that chance again. The guy can't help but smile these days when somebody else beats his teammate, which basically says it all.
 
I agree that if Vettel and Hamilton were in the Red Bull their race battles would indeed be spectacular.
But if the Red Bull car was as dominant as this year I can't really see that I would enjoy seeing the remaining drivers racing for third place.
I want to see Ferrari, McLaren and Mercedes with their respective drivers being in with a chance of a race win
The prospect of seeing several drivers having a real chance of winning as opposed to will Hamilton or Vettel win this week
is why I watch racing.
 
I want to see Ferrari, McLaren and Mercedes with their respective drivers being in with a chance of a race win

Ideally, yes, this is a much more preferable scenario. But with the regulations staying somewhat static for two more years, I'm having a hard time seeing Newey and the boys let their advantage slip away.

Who knows though, maybe Adrian was giving RBR fans a little warning with his comments about the mid-season regulation change. I can't imagine they won't still be at the top of the pecking order though.
 
Their actions spoke volumes last year. Let's face it, if they had wanted Webber to win last year, he would have. Lucky for them, Ferrari lost the plot and Marko's gamble paid off.

We both know that had it been VET-WEB in a P1-P2 situation at Abu Dhabi with ALO in 4th (or somesuch), then VET would have 'moved over'. But Webber didn't qualify well and then he hit the barriers while chasing Alonso for 4th in the early going.

So how is Webber being unable to be in P2 (at the very least) any fault of the Red Bull team?

Webber had enviable reliability in 2010 and lost the WDC of his own accord, frankly. You can't blame Red Bull for Webber losing the WDC. They gave him a car that (through luck or whatever else one might call it) was superior reliability-wise. Mark binned it at Korea and was no where near Vettel at Abu Dhabi to be able to take advantage of Vettel being a team player.

Going back to Incubus' point, though, it must be a slap in the face for Webber to read Horner's comments.

It might have been intentional. Possibly to do with money/compensation negotiations on Mark's 2012 contract package?
 
An absolute nothing article. Whether Lewis Hamilton drives a Red Bull or not will be absolutely nothing to do with what Christian Horner does or does not want in the team.

Money and Publicity are the name of the game for a team owned by a company who's number 1 aim is nothing to do with Formula 1 but all to do with promoting their brand.
 
@Ray

Before the final races they would have allowed Webber to expand his lead on the other competitors (through team orders admittedly), instead of bringing them all closer by letting Vettel nick points off his teammate.

In my opinion the fastest guy ended up winning, so in that sense, the right guy won the title. But if it had been Mark chasing Seb in the standings, the chase would have been called off by the team and they would have had the leader gain maximum points whenever possible.

The race that exemplifies this perfectly is Brazil. By this time, team orders were in de-facto acceptable. Most teams would have wanted the Championship leader to take that win with his teammate ahead, but Red Bull were clutching to the mathematical possibility that Vettel could still win the championship, which he of course did, bailing Marko and Co. out in the process.
 
@Ray
The race that exemplifies this perfectly is Brazil. By this time, team orders were in de-facto acceptable. Most teams would have wanted the Championship leader to take that win with his teammate ahead, but Red Bull were clutching to the mathematical possibility that Vettel could still win the championship, which he of course did, bailing Marko and Co. out in the process.

I think Brazil was the only instance where Webber finished directly behind Vettel in the late races.

While it was happening I thought it was absolutely the right thing for them not to call team orders that day. I don't think Red Bull were any different than Williams would have been since Mansell-Piquet days or McLaren last year.

Vettel not only deserved the win in Brazil, but he was also the "in form" man at RBR since Monza. Webber could have strengthed his bid by finishing Korea (the previous race), to be honest. Webber didn't deserve to have Vettel move over in Brazil. Had Webber been in P2 behind Vettel at Abu Dhabi with Alonso in position to pip the WDC, only then would orders been justified. Webber was too slow in the final 3rd of the year and Vettel was "in form", i.m.o., to have Brazil handed to him on a plate.

Had they given Brazil to Webber, they would have risked the WDC by giving themselves only 1 chance at the WDC instead of maintaining 2 chances.

So, from my perspective, they maximized their ability of taking the WDC by not having orders at Interlagos. By making sure BOTH had a chance at the title and ensuring Vettel wasn't having the wind taken out of his sails. By calling orders they would have deflated Vettel and put all their eggs in only one basket.

I think McLaren would have done the same thing that day.
 
Before this gets out of hand, this is a thread about Hamilton to Red Bull and Horners comments, NOT a thread about Red Bull team orders and Webbers form in 2010.

Cheers
 
Who knows though, maybe Adrian was giving RBR fans a little warning with his comments about the mid-season regulation change. I can't imagine they won't still be at the top of the pecking order though.
I don't think that there will much of change.
Newey being Newey for him to say hit hard probably means a couple tenths which to him is a huge amount.
 
I think Brazil was the only instance where Webber finished directly behind Vettel in the late races.

Well it started in Singapore where Webber trailed Vettel in a 2-3 finish. Then in Japan Mark followed Seb around the entire race finishing less than a second behind him in a 1-2.

But as I've already said, I think the better driver won, so I can't really complain or criticize Red Bull about it any longer.

My main, and final point on this is that if Red Bull had preferred that Webber win over Vettel last year, then I firmly believe that's what would have happened.
 
Back
Top Bottom