German Car Zone

Theissen: BMW starting to worry top teams

By Jonathan Noble Monday, April 16th 2007, 10:42 GMT

BMW Sauber believe they now have the leading teams 'worried' about their pace after what they feel was their strongest race of the season in Bahrain.

Nick Heidfeld took his third consecutive fourth placed finish at Sakhir, but more encouraging for the team was that his speed matched the cars ahead of him - and he was able to pull off a thrilling overtaking move past world champion Fernando Alonso.

BMW motorsport director Mario Theissen was delighted with the performance, and feels that the German manufacturer are closing in on both McLaren and Ferrari.

"Certainly it is a good feeling right now, and I think the guys in front are starting to worry about us," Theissen told autosport.com.

"We are happy because on the one hand it was just another fourth place, but it was also a very special fourth place because it was for the first time we could match the speed of the top teams.

"And Nick was the only guy out of the top six who overtook competitively on the track, so that was very special and our strongest performance so far."

Theissen admits, however, that he is unsure why his team were so competitive against Ferrari and McLaren in Bahrain, but had struggled to show similar pace in Malaysia the weekend before.

"I don't know why we were more competitive here," he said. "Maybe the others were struggling a bit, or maybe we were struggling a bit the week before.

"It was true that we did not have developments for this race and I am curious myself to see in Barcelona if it was track specific. If we are competitive in Spain we should be competitive almost everywhere."


source: autosport.com

It's too early to say so...

3 more races like this in the row and i'll admit it, but so far: and let's move on, there's still a lot of job to be done and the season just started.

But that it looks promising, that's true!

Red Bull a match for Renault - David Coulthard


David Coulthard refused to follow teammate Mark Webber's lead in Bahrain by angrily condemning Red Bull's lack of reliability in 2007.

Australian Webber did not mince his words when speaking to reporters after the Bahrain GP, where a stuck fuel flap and a broken gearbox ruined his day.


Veteran Coulthard, however, had been even more badly blighted at the desert surrounds of Sakhir, where two technical defects paused his RB3 single seater prior to the race.

Then, on Sunday, a masterly drive from the back of the grid to as high as seventh went begging when his driveshaft broke.

"I'm disappointed obviously but we have to go and look at the positives," Coulthard insisted.

The Scot said he took heart in Red Bull's progress since winter testing, after the Milton-Keynes built car looked genuinely a match for struggling champions Renault in Bahrain.

He explained: "As quickly as they have gone backwards we have gone forwards."

Coulthard said Red Bull's goal for the next few races is to finally score some points and become the fourth force on the grid, after proving quicker than big outfits like Toyota and Honda so far this year.

"We have to be realistic and as painful as it is parking the car, I'd rather park the car having had a good race rather than what we had last year," he said.

Source: GMM/ duemotori.com

BMW have the best supercomputer and best wind tunnel and is rumored to have the most powerfull engine, and until Spain there are 4 weeks of testing so ...
... oh and no more Williams engineers and the out of touch P. Head to give BMW and its drivers the middle finger when they wanted to give their input and receive/share data.

As shown by Toyota, pouring loads of money doesn't get the results, it the people who are involved!

I am very impressed by BMW though, but we can't expect too much, I thought 3rd was going to be too high, but at the moment that looks possible. Remember both Renault and Honda aren't doing so well, but once they sort out their problems, I'm sure they move back to the front!

I doubt it will be up to Hamilton to decide if he wants to change teams. Ron has a long-term contract with him. He has spent millions promoting him since he was 13! I wonder if Lewis will ever leave Mclaren. He may become a career Mclaren man like Mika.

Hamilton will make a billion dollars (literally) if he drives for Ferrari. Sooner or later I think he will try to leave Mclaren and make huge endorsement money. If it comes to that, they might have to sell him.

Assumption: I have read numerous times from credible F1 sources and magazines that Mclaren does not allow drivers to do personal endorsements.

Renault will still need an Alonso = (driver + tester/developer).
Just look at what happened to McMerc in 2006 when they lost their tester/developer boy wonder Alexander Wurz.

Oh, and Heidfeld is a tester/developer right up there with Alonso and Wurz and he might even be a driver.

The art of overtaking with inferior car.

Renault needs much more than that.
There are many other reasons that explain the 2006 disaster.
Heidfeld is a top developper, he's above alonso in that domain, it's a well know thing in F1 that he, wurz and michael were best developpers among drivers. And i also believed from the begining that he's a top pilot but he just hadn't the car to show it.

While I don't deny Heidfeld's merit, I do belive Alonso struggled with the car.

Now I hope that at Spain BMW can overtake both McMercs and Tifoseria cars working at 100%.