... However, I have been amazed by the progress of Swiss starlets Sauber. Since their arrival in the early 90's the little European team lead by manager and founder Peter Sauber has failed to attract the big names and the good engines but their traditional rule book has been turned upside-down ... Read review
Advantages: Plucky Swiss team deserves to be at the top flight after all these years Disadvantages: Not enough money, although coming 4th in the championship will have done them some favours
...by manager and founder Peter Sauber has failed to attract the big names and the good engines but their traditional rule book has been turned upside-down after finishing a magnificent and well- deserved 4th place in the manufacturers championship.
At the beginning of the year there were not many - if any - that believed the Sauber boys (and girls - i'm not sexist)would achieve a milestone in their rather bleak history. However, after ... ...Wurz. Despite his poor season Sauber looked more closely at his good history record and signed him - something they'll never regret.
Sauber were faced with a problem. Their poor 2001 had meant they had no drivers. They found Heidfeld but the second seat remained empty for most of the Winter. Possible drivers Pedro Diniz and Mika Salo had taken off for a management role at Prost and a test drive with Toyota respectively. Reluctantly ... more
I have been watching Formula one for years now and I have been fascinated with the teams this year. However, I have been amazed by the progress of Swiss starlets Sauber. Since their arrival in the early 90's the little European team lead by manager and founder Peter Sauber has failed to attract the big names and the good engines but their traditional rule book has been turned upside-down after finishing a magnificent and well- deserved 4th place in the manufacturers championship.
At the beginning of the year there were not many - if any - that believed the Sauber boys (and girls - i'm not sexist)would achieve a milestone in their rather bleak history. However, after encouraging test session which saw them leave bigger teams - namely Benetton and Jaguar - eating their dust, it seemed they could be a suprise package in a rather hum-drum Ferrari/Mclaren dominating sport.
If their form hadn't hit the news than their driver line-up did. First of all they chose German talent Nick Heidfeld who went unoticed throughout the whole of 2000 in the truwly awful Prost with a Peugeot engine with a liking to explosions. Their choice was an initially odd one. Why choose a No.1 driver with a poor 1st season behind him. Easy. Look at his hostory and you'll see why. In 1998 he drove a Formula 3000 Mclaren to 2nd in the championship just being edged out by the talent that was Juan Pablo Montoya - look at him now. In 1999 in the same car he made no mistake and rode away without lookin back. However, 2000 was a massive stumbling block for Heidfeld and after a year bumping, crashing and blowing-up looked certain to be cast to the F1 reject pile currently occupied by Gaston Mazzacane, Tarso Marques and Alex Wurz. Despite his poor season Sauber looked more closely at his good history record and signed him - something they'll never regret.
Sauber were faced with a problem. Their poor 2001 had meant they had no drivers. They found Heidfeld but the second seat remained empty for most of the Winter. Possible drivers Pedro Diniz and Mika Salo had taken off for a management role at Prost and a test drive with Toyota respectively. Reluctantly Peter Sauber looked further and further down the formulas and came to an unknown Finn knocking about in the Renault Formula series. He was called Kimi Raikkonen and he had just dominated the season. His credentials looked good. His manager was Steve Robertson, whose father managed Jenson Button. On these grounds Peter Sauber - bearing in mind the 21 year old had only 23 races under his belt - took his young prodigy to Mugello to see how well he'd perform. Suprisingly, the cool, calm Finn was quick off the blocks and Peter sauber looked like he had a possible starlet on his hands. Several tests and a Super licence later saw the flying Finn occupying the second seat at Sauber. His signing was a gamble and turned quite a few noses up including Michael Schumacher and FIA president Max Mosely so he had to perform in the first few races or he would be out quicker than he came in.
Since 1993, when the Swiss team climbed aboard the F1 bandwagon they have had to claw through many engines. In 1995 they had the quick but unreliable Ford engine which saw resident driver Heinz-Harald Frentzen clamber onto the podium twice. However, in 1996 the cash strapped team were provided with year old but reliable Ferarri engines. For the forst time Sauber were quick and reliable but the rest of the chassis couldn't live up to expectations. Their tendancy to drop back as the season progressed became a big worry. However, 2001 saw Sauber with championship winning engines. Badged Petronas, the old Ferrari engines were very quick and more reliable than any other car. A cash boost also saw the Swiss team with a car that could match the engine and their progress was displayed when they topped the Winter time sheets. Indeed, the time sheets were no bluffs. The time sheets never lie!!
2001 would be the Sauber success story. The first race of the season at Melbourne, Australia would be telling as to how the car and their unexperianced drivers performed. Much to our - and the other teams - suprise the Saubers performed excellently. They both qualified in the top 12 and in the race - despite a bad start started moving gradually up the field. At the end of a fantastic race, Heidfeld had finished in 4th place - higher than Frentzen's Jordan and Panis's BAR - while his team mate Kimi Raikkonen in only his 24 race was in an excellent 7th place and just out of the points. However, just a few hours after the race 5th place Olivier Panis was demoted to 7th place after recieving a 25 second penalty. This meant Frentzen was up to 5th and Raikkonen was in 6th and in the points in his very first race. A massive achievement.
From that day the team never looked back. Out of the two drivers the extra experiance of Nick Heidfeld saw him finish ahead of his Finnish team mate with 13 points and 7th in the championship. Those 13 points came from points at Brazil - where he finished a career high 3rd place - Britain, USA, France and Hunagary, while Kimi Raikkonens record consisted of two 4th places In Austria and Canada while his final tally finished in 10th with 9 points. Their overall total of 22 points means 4th place in the manufacturer standings. A quite incredible achievement.
For 2002, their reward money should see the team rising up through the field further despite a new challenge from Toyota. However, their talent of Kimi Raikkonen will not be there as he has moved to Mclaren to replace Mika Hakkinen. He has been replaced by Brazilian unknown Felipe Massa. His recent test sessions have been very encouraging and recently topped the time sheets at MUgello ahead of the Williams-BMW's. Nick Heidfeld is staying too and he'll hope to build on his points tally. He'll also be pushing even harder as he tries to beat Raikkonen who beat him to the Mclaren seat which he believed was originally for him.
Overall, I wish all the luck to the team and hope 2002 will be even more successful than 2001.
Advantages: Prospetcs are good. Disadvantages: A typical midfield runner
...Swiss team owned by Peter Sauber have been the suprise package so far this season. Lets face it. The tinyteam gained an advantage at Melbourne from gaining their 4 points via other drivers breaking the rules. Having Heidfeld promoted to 4th because of cheating by other drivers and subsequently getting the new finnish driver in the last point place because of time penalties to other drivers is no measure of the teams performance. Saying all of this, ... ...as the Brainchild of Peter Sauber in 1993, he started the season with 2 promising drivers, Karl Wendlinger and JJ Lehto. WEndlinger showed good speed and early promise and was soon making headlines. Then in 1994, Lehto went to Benetton and got injured. Wendlinger stayed on and also had a horrific crash that basically saw the end of his career. He was joined that year by future Jordan Star, Heinz Harald Frentzen.He stayed for 2 years with the team. ...
andycharger 11.03.2001
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Sauber
Advantages: Small,friendly,team. Good drivers in Kimi Raikkonen and Nick Heidfeld Disadvantages: Not fast enough to challenge the top 3 teams.
...strong interest in the Swiss-based Sauber team because one of its major sponsors is the Malaysian Petronas Company and I currently live and work in Malaysia. The team is showing some signs of improvement and the drivers,Pedro Diniz and Mika Salo,have promising potential. However, Sauber needs to demonstrate greater reliability and it does not look as though their cars can match the likes of McLaren,Ferrari,or teams such as Williams,Benneton or Jordan.I ... ...the grid. However, for the Sauber to be up there challenging for a podium position,major improvements would be needed. Realistically I believe Sauber will remain a backmarker for the short term at least.
Update
Suddenly there is an air of optimism in the Swiss-based Red Bull Sauber Petronas motor racing team. The team have never won a race in nine years in Formula I and their last podium finish was Frenchman's Jean Alesi's third place in Belgium ...
ashford 23.06.2000 (10.07.2001)
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Sauber
i beleive that the sauber team is on the same level as the prost team,a mid field also ran who can not really challenge for the top honours of points.the drivers are ok but nothing out of this world or breath taking and i feel that the formula 1 veterans are still a long way behind the likes of benetton and jordan,let alone mclaren and ferrari. saubers main problems are their lack of good speed and realiability and this has cost them dearly on many ...
steveymacca 09.09.2000
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Advantages: Consistent levels of mechanical reliability Disadvantages: Mediocre performance, ever-decreasing level of financial competitiveness
The Malaysian sponsored Sauber Petronas team are one of Formula ones archetypal underachievers. The product of A move by Swiss enthusiast Peter Sauber (who had led the Mercedes touring cars to great success in the early part of the 90's/late 80's) to break into Formula One - the team has oftwen threatened to do well, but has been hampered by unreliability and too often employing drivers whose reputations were not up to the task of putting a mediocre ... ...pockets.
The future for Sauber looks to be more of the same. The relentless domination of Mclaren.Ferrari means that pickings for the rest are ultimately slim. This is made even more so by a difficulty in achieving the levels of power necessary to keep pace, let alone overtake... I would say that until Sauber can step up to regularly make the top ten of qualification, they will continue to struggle, although they will probably garner enough points ...
bwsr2 26.01.2001
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Advantages: Great Team Disadvantages: Need more research
I have always been suppotign Sauber since I started following F1. Being a Malaysian, I believe that Sauber Petronas has a good future in F1. At present they are using Ferrari engine, but I predict in future they will use their engine. I will foresee a scenario as below:
Proton brought over Lotus couple of years ago and own 80% of it. Petronas is going to buy over Proton by this year end. So in future, we may be talking a Sauber-Petronas team with ...
dwll5 28.07.2000
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Advantages: Reasonable experience. Disadvantages: Inconsistent. Not quick. Poor in qualifying.
It seems Alexander Wurz is unlikely to be with Benetton for next season. The team has been very disappointed with the lanky Austrian's performance -his qualifying times have been pretty abysmal,he seems to lack confidence and has not been doing justice to his team. The team are rumoured to have been seeking alternatives to Wurz. Names mentioned include Benetton test driver Antonio Pizzonia -but he has been deemed a year or so away from being ready for FI racing- and that of the brilliant young British driver Jenson Button,who has also been linked to Jaguar.
Things look a bit bleak for Wurz. With the exception perhaps of a possible move to the Sauber team- as current driver Mika Salo is said to be moving to Toyota as its development driver in preparation for entry into Formula I in 2002- Alexander could well find himself without a drive ...
ashford 13.08.2000
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Alexander Wurz
When mika drived for ferrari,he showed he can handle it at the top as he got a number of points with no previous experience or testing of the car.This shows terrific composure,and he has had a decent season in the improving Sauber this year.He is gaining more experience with every race he comptes in and is developing into a very mature driver.I think that he is a big future in f1,and placed in a more competitve package,will be able to compete successfully with the very best.I expect him to appear in the top 5 of the title some time in the not so distant future. ...
steveymacca 09.09.2000
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Mika Salo
What a bungling baffoon this man is. He has never been the same since his big crash in 1988. He should have hung up the gloves and retired many years ago. He can not do anything in that new car. Fair enough, he has clawed 3 wins in his career but anyone can do that. Basically his talents were never realised so If I was Johnny, rather than become a tail end charlie, I would quit. Instead he is going to USA next year to embarass himself over there in an indy car. When will the man learn?? He was out Qualified by Schumi at Benetton, Alesi at Sauber, Barichello at Stewart and now Irvine at Jaguar!! Wake up Johnny. Time to go!! ...
andycharger 11.08.2000
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Johnny Herbert
