I probably should have started this last year to keep track of F1's off-season happenings, but since the first car has been revealed and the first round of Barcelona testing is nearly upon us, now is as gooder time as any:

Nico Rosberg retired and Mercedes selected Valtteri Bottas. There's already a thread on this somewhere.

Valtteri's move to Mercedes opened up his Williams seat, which has since been filled by bringing Massa out of retirement.

Manor F1 Team has gone broke and it looks as if there is no chance of it being bought/revived.

Pascal Wehrlein was confirmed to drive alongside Marcus Ericsson at Sauber, though since then has had a neck injury afters a serious crash at Race Of Champions. At this stage it is confirmed that he will not be driving at Barcelona testing, with Ferrari/Sauber's reserve driver Antonio Giovinazzi standing in for him. There are rumors circulating that he may miss the Australian Grand Prix as well.

Felipe Nasr has no seat for 2017.

The 2017 Ferrari will be called the SF70-H (70th anniversary of the first car to bear the Ferrari name)

2017 car reveal dates:
Sauber 20/02 (photos below)
Renault 21/02
Force India 22/02
Mercedes 23/02
Ferrari 24/02
McLaren 24/02
Williams 25/02
Red Bull 26/02
Toro Rosso 26/02
Haas 26/02

Testing Dates:
First Barcelona Test 2017-02-27 to 2017-03-02
Second Barcelona Test 2017-03-07 to 2017-03-10

Yesterday was the reveal of the Sauber C36:

The Sauber looks good - apart from that butt-ugly fin at the back.

Testing will be interesting, if not completely revealing (as usual).

oh the fat tyres

Gorgeous Sauber ! The air intake in two parts comes from regulation ? Can't wait to see what's the Renault looks like this afternoon !

I wish Merc will not dominate this year as previouses because I can't see Bottas challenging Lewis much. Hope to be proven wrong.

Its interesting that many of the same old arguments have reared their heads during this off season - budget caps (do that and I'm watching something else), freezing Mercedes engine to allow others to catch up (again, do that and I'm watching something else) etc etc etc.

More and more interference being suggested.

Here is the Renault:

Great to see an off season thread here!

I look forward to this season. Hopefully its not another single dominant team (as has been since 2009, pretty much).

I love this week. Being in the midwestern USA, I wake up to see a new F1 car being launched.

Today was Force India -
Sergio Perez and his new teammate Esteban Ocon launched the team's 10th F1 car.



(Pics from Facebook page Die Hard F1 Fans)

Another car with the shark fin. These were last seen in 2010 (I think). However, the livery looks kinda bland. Expected from Sahara Force India

Mercedes AMG tomorrow!

The Force India has everything that I hate: penis nose, steeped nose and shark fin.

And yes, the livery is bland.

I take it back, Force India's fin make the Sauber look like a work of art.

Expected more* from Force India, my bad..

scbriml wrote:

I take it back, Force India's fin make the Sauber look like a work of art.

It looks like they glued some plywood from the nearest DIY store...

And the new Mercedes W08 looks stunning without (hopefully permanently) a bloody big fin. The car looks noticeably narrower at the rear than others launched so far.

http://www.skysports.com/f1/news/12472/ ... r-in-a-row




And in what could be very bad news for the rest of F1, Mercedes may have a beast of a new engine for 2017. At least according to their customers...
https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/merc ... ne-876216/

Mercedes has made an ‘unprecedented step’ with its 2017 Formula 1 engine, one of its customer teams has revealed, in a move that could have dramatic implications for the title fight.

scbriml wrote:

And in what could be very bad news for the rest of F1, Mercedes may have a beast of a new engine for 2017. At least according to their customers...

Let's hope it's not the case, or that the others have a performing engine as well, because I don't think I'll be able to bear another season dominated by Mercedes...

Mercedes will be testing a shark-fin later.

Ferrari and McLaren tomorrow!
I wonder if McLaren will be going for a orange livery, as far as their tweets have hinted...

scbriml wrote:

And in what could be very bad news for the rest of F1, Mercedes may have a beast of a new engine for 2017. At least according to their customers...
https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/merc ... ne-876216/

Mercedes has made an ‘unprecedented step’ with its 2017 Formula 1 engine, one of its customer teams has revealed, in a move that could have dramatic implications for the title fight.

And that beast may be temperamental. Got a few more weeks to see how it goes!

Less than 5 minutes till the Ferrari SF-70H is launched!

A white shark fin, a T-tail, small side pods, thumb nose.... Oh dear.

CollegeAviator wrote:

A white shark fin, a T-tail, small side pods, thumb nose.... Oh dear.

The Sauber's looking better and better.

CollegeAviator wrote:

Ferrari SF-70H

Hmmm... meh, and I am a hard core Ferrari-man myself, but I´m not expecting much from Maranello this year either, hopefully they´ll prove me wrong but... we´ll see.

They could´ve designed the car more in the same shape as the Merc.

SF-70H... is 70 the top speed?

MIAspotter.

The stance of the Fezza is straight out of RBR's school of design.

McLaren will indeed be orange. With Ferrari, Renault, McLaren and Sauber, at least we'll have colours on the grid.

Anybody noticed how the new McLaren is known as the MCL32? That's one way of getting rid of Ron Dennis' legacy.

Sure hope Honda can provide some potent power this year instead of giving McLaren a Honda Civic engine.

Cars were meant to be wider, but I don't have that feel. The reason is probably the bigger tyres, but still, it's a bit disappointing:

I like seeing McLaren in Papaya Orange, Bruce would be proud!

GrahamHill wrote:

Cars were meant to be wider, but I don't have that feel. The reason is probably the bigger tyres, but still, it's a bit disappointing:

Reposting the screenshot:

Mercedes looks like they have a really well put together car...usually if it looks fast it is! Seems like they've had a quiet offseason aside from the driver drama, and seeing as they allegedly stopped developing the 2016 car very early on, the extra development time should help them maintain their advantage.

Sauber- At least they built a looker, but seeing as they're running year old PU's, the only time we might see them is when they're getting lapped.

Williams- looks like a revision of the 2016 car. Hopefully they're holding their cards close to their chest, because otherwise I imagine the FW40 is gonna be garbage in the corners again.

Force India- I've always liked their scrappy underdog nature, but this year's car is pretty ugly. Curious to see how they follow up last year's impressive finish.

Ferrari- one of the most interesting cars so far. The sidepods and aero around it has me very interested. Hopefully they make progress.

Renault- Will be interesting to see how their first new car is, as last years was basically a Lotus with a Renault PU.

TR- Curious to see how they do with an up to date engine.

McLaren- if they bring out another dog of a car, I'm gonna feel so bad for Alo. McLaren has seemed so lost since 2008, slowly fading into obscurity. Hopefully Honda can build something better than a gp2 engine.

Red bull- Always the interesting ones. They just launched the RB13 and I'm already super curious about the hole in the nose, and what Newey's come up with. Exciting times ahead!!!

Toro Rosso STR12


Haas VF-17


Williams FW40


Poll time! Which car looks the best? http://www.strawpoll.me/12428731
I think the Sauber looks best. The Renault would, were it not for way too much black in their livery.

scbriml wrote:

And the new Mercedes W08 looks stunning without (hopefully permanently) a bloody big fin. The car looks noticeably narrower at the rear than others launched so far.

Please be slow.

GrahamHill wrote:

Let's hope it's not the case, or that the others have a performing engine as well, because I don't think I'll be able to bear another season dominated by Mercedes...

Nor will I. Especially since all this aero stuff is going to make so much dirty air that overtaking cars of similar performance will be very, very difficult.

CollegeAviator wrote:

Ferrari SF-70H

Looks like Kimi has done an excellent job with the car's development! The sidepod is just straight-up pornography!

GrahamHill wrote:

McLaren will indeed be orange. With Ferrari, Renault, McLaren and Sauber, at least we'll have colours on the grid.

That nose to body join looks amazing!

Testing update - Hamilton quickest for Mercedes on soft tyres, Massa second in the Williams (soft tyres again), and Vettel 1s off in third on medium tyres.

Hamilton and Bottas have completed 100+ laps, Vettel has done about 80.

Red Bull and McLaren Honda have gone kaput...

Mercedes has implemented its shark fin:

GrahamHill wrote:

Mercedes has implemented its shark fin:

Not as ugly as some of the others and an interesting hole in it (presumably for additional engine cooling?)

As for those ugly little T wings...

scbriml wrote:

GrahamHill wrote:

Mercedes has implemented its shark fin:

Not as ugly as some of the others and an interesting hole in it (presumably for additional engine cooling?)

As for those ugly little T wings...

Christian Horner is not a fan of the shark fin either. Apparently he tried to have them banned, but other teams said no: http://www.autosport.com/news/report.ph ... n-loophole

And, yes, the T wing is horrible. I saw that Williams and Haas were using one too.

GrahamHill wrote:

And, yes, the T wing is horrible. I saw that Williams and Haas were using one too.

The Mercedes 'double-decker' one is even uglier!

http://www.hasstrollcrashedyet.com

Oh dear...
http://www.bbc.com/sport/formula1/39139492

Williams have been forced to cancel running on the final day of the first pre-season test because of damage sustained in a crash on Wednesday.

Williams discovered a chassis had been damaged when novice driver Lance Stroll spun into the barriers.

That meant his team-mate Felipe Massa was unable to take part on Thursday.

zkojq wrote:

http://www.hasstrollcrashedyet.com

Oh dear...
http://www.bbc.com/sport/formula1/39139492

I'll give him a chance to prove he can do it. He's not Maldonado... yet...

mad99 wrote:

so funny the way Williams is saying it's not Lance's fault. He must be bringing big money to the team

$80,000,000 reportedly. No wonder they're so forgiving.

http://autoweek.com/article/formula-one ... on-f1-seat

Statistics from the end of the first week of testing:

McLaren's testing problems have gone from bad to worse. They must have had to stop on track due to engine problems at least five times already today and it's only just lunchtime.




https://twitter.com/raddie_cz/status/839809115648057344

Final lap count for the morning session:

1 Vettel (60)
2 Hamilton (52)
3 Ocon (51)
4 Kvyat (34)
5 Ricciardo (41)
6 Magnussen (45)
7 Vandoorne (33)
8 Palmer (31)
9 Ericsson (88)
10 Stroll (85)

Not as visible as McLaren but team with Renault power unit are not logging as much laps as Mercedes and Ferrari either...

And the Ferrari seems to be really quick, of course we don't know the config but this morning Vettel scored a 1:19.024 with soft tires. Really impressive knowing some journalist said he stopped the effort just before the finish line, loosing ~0,4s in the process.

Any bets on Fernando Alonso having a fiery Latin hissy fit and walking out on McClaren, because he's not happy with the Honda power unit, and Jenson Button getting a recall?

Dano1977 wrote:

Any bets on Fernando Alonso having a fiery Latin hissy fit and walking out on McClaren, because he's not happy with the Honda power unit, and Jenson Button getting a recall?

I think this will be Alonsos final season with McLaren, for sure.

When I first heard that this seasons Honda engine was a completely new design, and not an evolution on last years, I had a feeling it was going to turn out this way - Honda basically lost all the reliability gains McLaren earned them over the past two seasons when they threw that design out the window, and its back to square one.

Grizzly410 wrote:

Not as visible as McLaren but team with Renault power unit are not logging as much laps as Mercedes and Ferrari either...

And the Ferrari seems to be really quick, of course we don't know the config but this morning Vettel scored a 1:19.024 with soft tires. Really impressive knowing some journalist said he stopped the effort just before the finish line, loosing ~0,4s in the process.

That's correct. Here is the final mileage after 8 days of tests:


Mercedes 5,101.9 km
Ferrari 4,445.5 km
Williams 3,724 km
Sauber 3,663.5 km
Force India 3,654.2 km
Red Bull 3,184 km
Haas 3,170.1 km
Renault 2,774.4 km
Toro Rosso 2,718.5 km
McLaren 2,127.3 km

That's 8,676.9 km cumulated for the Renault engines vs 12,480.1 km for Mercedes and 11,279.1 km for Ferrari.

Honda is far far far behind...


And here are the combined fastest time of this winter pre-test:

Position Team Model Time Gap
1 Ferrari SF70H 1’18.634
2 Mercedes W08 1’19.310 +0.676
3 Williams FW40 1’19.420 +0.786
4 Red Bull RB13 1’19.438 +0.804
5 Toro Rosso STR12 1’19.837 +1.203
6 Renault RS17 1’19.885 +1.251
7 Force India VJM10 1’20.116 +1.482
8 Haas VF-17 1’20.504 +1.870
9 McLaren MCL32 1’21.348 +2.714
10 Sauber C36 1’21.670 +3.036

A comparison between last year's pole and this year's winter testing fastest lap:

https://www.facebook.com/Formula1/video ... 009581250/

Grizzly410 wrote:

And the Ferrari seems to be really quick, of course we don't know the config but this morning Vettel scored a 1:19.024 with soft tires. Really impressive knowing some journalist said he stopped the effort just before the finish line, loosing ~0,4s in the process.

Ferrari looked to be really quick in pre-season testing last year as well. Just saying...

scbriml wrote:

Grizzly410 wrote:

And the Ferrari seems to be really quick, of course we don't know the config but this morning Vettel scored a 1:19.024 with soft tires. Really impressive knowing some journalist said he stopped the effort just before the finish line, loosing ~0,4s in the process.

Ferrari looked to be really quick in pre-season testing last year as well. Just saying...

And some teams could not show their true potential yet. For example, Renault said they did their pre-season testing in "conservative" mode in order not to be affected too much by reliability issues. They knew they had an ERS issue prior to starting the tests, so they just couldn't use the engine full blast.

I have a feeling that Mercedes haven't shown all of their cards yet.

Force India revealed new colours, following the partnership with BWT.



Not a huge fan of pink for a race car (except for the mighty Porsche 917 "Pink Pig"), but I think it's still an improvement compared to the previous livery.

Between McLaren's orange, Renault's yellow, Ferrari's red, Toro Rosso and Sauber's electric blue, and now Force India's pink, we'll have quite a variety of colours this year on the grid!

Several news outlets are reporting that Honda is as much as 100bhp down on its closest rival, mainly due to them running the engine conservatively due to the reliability issues, which still showed its ugly head anyway.

If thats true, thats it for Honda in this sport - 3 years in and they cant produce a reliable engine?!

GrahamHill wrote:

That's correct. Here is the final mileage after 8 days of tests:


Mercedes 5,101.9 km
Ferrari 4,445.5 km
Williams 3,724 km
Sauber 3,663.5 km
Force India 3,654.2 km
Red Bull 3,184 km
Haas 3,170.1 km
Renault 2,774.4 km
Toro Rosso 2,718.5 km
McLaren 2,127.3 km

That's 8,676.9 km cumulated for the Renault engines vs 12,480.1 km for Mercedes and 11,279.1 km for Ferrari.

You shouldn't really include Sauber in Ferrari's numbers though as they are running 2016 Ferrari engines.

scbriml wrote:

Grizzly410 wrote:

And the Ferrari seems to be really quick, of course we don't know the config but this morning Vettel scored a 1:19.024 with soft tires. Really impressive knowing some journalist said he stopped the effort just before the finish line, loosing ~0,4s in the process.

Ferrari looked to be really quick in pre-season testing last year as well. Just saying...

A lot of people are saying that Ferrari is doing a lot more sandbagging this year and Marchionne is saying that Mercedes is quicker, which is a good sign. Regardless, the Ferrari Hype Train is pretty much out of control at this point.
http://i.imgur.com/PW3cwOt.jpg

http://en.f1i.com/news/261879-mercedes- ... ionne.html

GrahamHill wrote:

Between McLaren's orange, Renault's yellow, Ferrari's red, Toro Rosso and Sauber's electric blue, and now Force India's pink, we'll have quite a variety of colours this year on the grid!

Didn't think I'd ever like a pink F1 car, but hats off to Force India because that one looks ok (similar situation to WowAir and the pink A330 lol) and certainly better than their previous Silver/Black/Orange combination. The variety of colours down the grid is excellent. I've just confirmed my tickets for the Melbourne GP - very exciting to see the racing this year.