Well I think he'll end up doing just that OR stay because Kimi sits out the yr by choice.

I thought Heikki would have done well at Toyota but alas, no such luck. Well, if you can call it luck.

Anyway, which teams are available and palatable other than McLaren for Heikki now ? He's got to beat out Glock to Renault...and if RBR are getting Renault engines on their announcement then it's a good sign that Renault isn't bailing.

Sauber Ferrari ? Heikki and Heidfeld at Sauber Ferrari isn't such a bad deal. Sort of like your Cool Northern Euro Ferrari team B contrast version to the hot-blooded all-latin factory team.

He wouldn't drive for the choker Tost at STR...would he ?
Naaaah.


Chances are high that he stays if Kimi boots it.

stefmeister - 06 November 2009 10:31 PM

I think something to remember when talking about how Heikki shoudl have done better with the car considering what Lewis did with it, Is that most the time Lewis had a better spec car & a car that suited him more than it did Heikki.

The McLaren car is built around Lewis, The car is designed to run stiff & work the tyres to suit the way Lewis drives.

You see that Lewis is always locking front tyres due to the way he loves the car to be stiff, He likes to slide the car around so the rear suspension setup's are built around that to try & not destroy tyres like he often did back in 2007.

Its likely that Heikki's smoother driving style doesn't suit the car as well as it does Lewis or that the way the car is doesn't suit the way Heikki likes to have his setup.


Something else to consider is KERS. I recall reading something earlier this year which mentioned the different way Lewis & Heikki would use KERS.

Can't recall exact details but it basically mentioned that Lewis was more aggressive with KERS, He would set it to charge more under braking & also set it to discharge faster when been used. Heikki on the other hand had the charge level set lower because having it set like Lewis didn't suit his braking style, so he therefore had to have it discharge its power slower.

While for example KERS was giving Lewis say .4 like they said it was at Abu-Dhabi, Perhaps by using it differently Heikki was only getting .2 advantage.

The analogy I use is the Schumi/Rubens pairing. There is NO doubt the car and strategies were built around Michael. But Rubens had respectable performances in that car. I'm not going to go dig up several years of data, but my memory recalls him as not embarrassing himself, outperforming Michael on a reasonable # of races (given the circumstances), and serving his role with very good finishes, finishing behind Michael but not embarrassingly so. So as with Rubens/Schumi, I do not expect Heikki to outperform Lewis given the differentials in favoritism (and talent), but I do expect respectable performances from him far more consistently. And I think he has not delivered in that regard.

stefmeister - 06 November 2009 10:31 PM

I think something to remember when talking about how Heikki shoudl have done better with the car considering what Lewis did with it, Is that most the time Lewis had a better spec car & a car that suited him more than it did Heikki.

The McLaren car is built around Lewis, The car is designed to run stiff & work the tyres to suit the way Lewis drives.

You see that Lewis is always locking front tyres due to the way he loves the car to be stiff, He likes to slide the car around so the rear suspension setup's are built around that to try & not destroy tyres like he often did back in 2007.

Its likely that Heikki's smoother driving style doesn't suit the car as well as it does Lewis or that the way the car is doesn't suit the way Heikki likes to have his setup.


Something else to consider is KERS. I recall reading something earlier this year which mentioned the different way Lewis & Heikki would use KERS.

Can't recall exact details but it basically mentioned that Lewis was more aggressive with KERS, He would set it to charge more under braking & also set it to discharge faster when been used. Heikki on the other hand had the charge level set lower because having it set like Lewis didn't suit his braking style, so he therefore had to have it discharge its power slower.

While for example KERS was giving Lewis say .4 like they said it was at Abu-Dhabi, Perhaps by using it differently Heikki was only getting .2 advantage.

To be polite, I think alot of the above are mere excuses.

To say that most of the time Hamilton had better parts than Heikki is to suggest that Mclaren was providing updates to the car every race. Which of course wasn't the case.

On a few occasions, the team was unable to produce 2 sets of parts for a race and yes, Hamilton got the updated parts first. But at the very next race Heikki would get those same parts.

Further, Heikki himself would often say how good the car was, during practice, only to then say the car wasn't quite there if he didn't qualify well. Or if he qualified well but failed to finish well.

I would have been willing to cut Heikki some slack if he were able to finish his races within 2-3 positions where he started on the grid. Sadly, he often failed to do that.

Now go back and look at Hamilton's season. See how many times he finished well ahead of his started position.

Ultimately, that's what a driver has to deliver on - to move the the front. Heikki goes in the opposite direction. He generally does not deliver the performance the car is capable of, with or without updated parts.

During the second half of the season, Hamilton ended up with 4 poles. How many of those races did Hamilton have a car with more updated parts than Heikki's?

oracle - 07 November 2009 11:27 PM

To be polite, I think alot of the above are mere excuses.
On a few occasions, the team was unable to produce 2 sets of parts for a race and yes, Hamilton got the updated parts first. But at the very next race Heikki would get those same parts.

Further, Heikki himself would often say how good the car was, during practice, only to then say the car wasn't quite there if he didn't qualify well. Or if he qualified well but failed to finish well.

I would have been willing to cut Heikki some slack if he were able to finish his races within 2-3 positions where he started on the grid. Sadly, he often failed to do that.

Now go back and look at Hamilton's season. See how many times he finished well ahead of his started position.

Ultimately, that's what a driver has to deliver on - to move the the front. Heikki goes in the opposite direction. He generally does not deliver the performance the car is capable of, with or without updated parts.

During the second half of the season, Hamilton ended up with 4 poles. How many of those races did Hamilton have a car with more updated parts than Heikki's?

Heikki admitted last season that he couldn't adapt to the car's development, especially the rear tyre wear.

He was working on adapting his style to make the most of the car.

It's certainly something Button got a lesson on when the Brawn car became more aligned with Rubens' style in the second half of the season.


These are in a way "good learning experiences" for the driver and having to change one's driving style away from their comfort zone and still deliver competitive performance (within 1-2 tenths) to your teammate can only make a driver better in the long run.

Having said that: perhaps its time for Heikki to go to a team that will allow him to get a car that suits his style and give him new parts on the same weekend as his teammate ?