| By Scott Mitchell | |
| Features Editor |
Since joining the Formula 1 grid in 2010, the team latterly known as Manor has had three names and scored three points. It would be easy to reach the conclusion that F1 is no worse off without Manor, the last of the trio of new-in-2010 teams to fall. The 2017 grid will be filled by 20 cars from 10 teams, all of which are better prospects than Manor to challenge regularly in the midfield. Over seven seasons its car was always slower than the established teams. There was plenty of driver instability in the later years - Luiz Razia failing to come through with the money at the start of 2013, Roberto Merhi and Alexander Rossi seat-sharing in '15, and Rio Haryanto being dropped halfway though '16. So Manor drops off - it just means the worst team on the grid will, probably, be Sauber. And Sauber has got new backers, which means the new worst team on the grid is not only a well-established one but one that has a decent short-term future. No real loss, then. Manor never established itself as a stable entry; in a game of multi-millions it was hardly going to cut it and hardly befitting of what Formula 1 has grown into. And never did it threaten to do as Haas did in 2016. Now that is how you create a new F1 team. But, of course, Manor (as Virgin) entered F1 under a very different set of circumstances to Haas. A dropped budget cap and a flawed (but necessary) CFD-dependent car design meant the Virgin entry of 2010, spearheaded by Toyota refugee Timo Glock and GP2 frontrunner Lucas di Grassi, hardly hit the ground running. It was a far cry from the Dallara/Ferrari-assisted, well-funded, entered-a-year-later-than-planned Haas operation.
This looks to be the final chapter for Manor. And while it may not look like one on paper, it is a loss to Formula 1. Most obviously, two seats are off the table. It's easy to scoff at Manor being the modern Minardi (even though the Faenza squad still exists, technically, as Toro Rosso) or some other back-of-the-grid equivalent. But look at its drivers. Without Manor, highly rated Mercedes juniors Pascal Wehrlein and Esteban Ocon would not have made their grand prix debuts last year. Ditto Ferrari junior Jules Bianchi in 2013. In fact, Manor hardly recruited poorly on the driver front. Everyone was a junior single-seater race winner, if not a champion, right from its first pairing of di Grassi and Glock to the 'worst' line-up of Will Stevens and Merhi/Rossi in 2015. Digging deeper, and the 'worst team on the grid' has traditionally had a key part to play in presenting opportunities for talented young drivers. Big teams are conservative by nature and that makes it difficult for the best young talent to simply walk into a proper seat. Take the past two decades as a sample set, and a host of very talented - often serious junior title-winning - drivers made their debut at the wheel of the worst car on the grid that season (based on the final constructors' standings). Working backwards (and excluding Manor), there's Daniel Ricciardo at HRT in 2011. Toro Rosso gave chances to Jaime Alguersuari and Sebastien Buemi. Adrian Sutil first appeared with Force India in 2007. Minardi gave Gianmaria Bruni (2004), Mark Webber ('02) and Fernando Alonso ('01) their debuts.
Nick Heidfeld appeared for the first time in a Prost in 2000, Pedro de la Rosa drove for Arrows in 1999, while Jarno Trulli and Giancarlo Fisichella performed admirably for Minardi in '97 and '96 respectively. Yes, there are always going to be good and bad teams in F1, and - yes - someone always has to finish last. Wehrlein has found refuge with Sauber, which is encouraging, but look at the next crop of talent - there's no room at the inn for Pierre Gasly, Antonio Giovinazzi or Charles Leclerc at the moment. That's not to say Manor sticking around in 2017 would guarantee them a drive, but it would be another option. Haas, which has a technical partnership with Ferrari, ruled out Leclerc as a team-mate to Romain Grosjean on the grounds of experience. Circumstances played a part, but that wasn't a problem for Manor and Wehrlein or Ocon. The same argument applies to technical personnel - teams such as Manor give talented individuals a chance to show their worth. They might be new engineers and mechanics who have been given the opportunity to work for a grand prix team that might otherwise have been out of reach. Equally they could be like Dave Greenwood, the ex-BAR/Renault man who spent four years with Virgin/Marussia before being recruited by Ferrari when Marussia looked done-for at the end of 2014. Teams such as Manor offer opportunities. They can also be the source of an endearing storyline. While HRT and Caterham will likely be remembered poorly, Manor's rollercoaster existence had a hearty underdog plot. The likes of Force India and Williams are strong independent outfits fighting the good fight, so F1 has not been robbed of its option for a 'small team done good'. But the resilience shown by the Manor entry has been admirable. In some ways it's an accomplishment that Manor made it to seven seasons. Along with Lotus and HRT, the then-Virgin squad entered a world with a revenue distribution system not designed for 12 teams. 'Column 1' payments are equal payments for teams that finished in the top 10 of the constructors' championship for two of the past three years - so 2012 was the earliest for a bigger slice of the pie. 'Column 2' payments are on a sliding scale from first to 10th from the previous season's constructors' championship.
So the only regular money the new teams would get back from the championship would be a nominal $10million agreed as part of a new 'Column 3'. That's less than several teams get as part of individually agreed deals - like the constructors' championship bonus for Ferrari, Mercedes, Red Bull and McLaren. Or Ferrari's long-standing team payment. Or Williams's heritage bonus. Or Red Bull's payment for signing the new agreement first. Or Mercedes' bonus for meeting an agreed target of winning two titles. You get the picture. The deck was stacked against Virgin, Lotus and HRT in 2010. No wonder HRT folded at the end of 2012 and Lotus-turned-Caterham just about saw out the '14 season (by missing a couple of races towards the end). Virgin fought on, first as Marussia (2012-14, after investment from Andrei Cheglakov) and then Manor (when Stephen Fitzpatrick spearheaded its revival for 2015-16). But its best intentions were often hindered by horrific luck as a team. Test driver Maria de Villota lost her right eye and was left in a critical but stable condition following a crash in 2012. She passed in away in October 2013, and her family stated that it was a consequence of the injuries sustained in the accident. Then, a year later, came Bianchi's Japanese Grand Prix crash. The Frenchman delivered Marussia's greatest accomplishment when he scored points in the Monaco GP. But his accident in wet conditions at Suzuka left him in a coma, and he died the following year. Marussia raced on in Bianchi's memory, though like Caterham it hit serious financial issues at the end of 2014. It missed the final three races, but somehow secured new investment for 2015. Manor was 'born' - though it had no official links to its former Marussia owners, it had to retain the name for its chassis to qualify for the £30million Bianchi's Monaco points had earned it the previous year.
Manor failed to turn a wheel at the season-opening 2015 Australian Grand Prix and Stevens was withdrawn from the next race in Malaysia. Merhi started, though, and made the finish. And so the team continued for the rest of the year, even though it was a tough slog with a year-old car devoid of any meaningful updates for the new season. Writing off Manor as a shambles is an immature response, and one that ignores the fact that it seemed to be genuinely getting its house in order. The 2016 season was its most competitive - a Mercedes engine deal and a proper 'new' car helped Wehrlein scored a point, in Austria, and in terms of its performance relative to other teams it was the most credible in its seven-year existence. Comparing supertimes - the fastest lap from each team over a weekend expressed as a percentage - illustrates the progress from the beginning to the end. Excluding the anomalous 2015 dip, for the reasons outlined earlier, Manor consistently closed the gap to the pack ahead (Mercedes moved the overall goalposts for everybody in '14). Manor's competitive progressComparison of 'supertime' performance from 2010-2016.NB. 'Next-worst team' of those established before 2010If nothing else, Manor deserves credit for that impressive perseverance. Accidents and financial collapse have ruined plenty of teams over F1's history, so one outfit enduring a brace of both is, at best, severe misfortune. At its heart it was a solid race team that was far from a failure, even if on paper three points from 132 grand prix appearances is a paltry return. On a more basic human level, it is never desirable to see a team shut down. Around 100 employees were still working at the Manor base in Banbury at the start of this year, and unless they have something immediately lined up, that is a high number of talented individuals who are now out of work. It has wider ramifications for families, too. If you're feeling sentimental, you could argue F1 let Manor down by not doing more to rush to its aid after the financial issues that followed the desperately sad accidents of de Villota and Bianchi. But that's not really the responsibility of the other teams. Where the finger can be pointed is the harsh conditions Manor entered under, way back in 2010. Elite sport is supposed to be difficult, but it's not supposed to be impossible. If F1 wants to do anything to ensure that credible, deserving entries like Manor actually have chance to thrive, it effectively needs a blank sheet of paper. Revising the current financial system is one thing, but arguably the whole set-up needs a rewrite. Manor's biggest flaw was not having the sagacity to predict what was to come and say 'Actually, this is massively unrealistic'. Haas has shown what is possible if a new team enters F1 with the right support and under a sensible framework. That such a system did not exist several years ago is not really Manor's fault. Its collapse does not have the same roots as the failures of HRT or Caterham, for example. It was the most fundamentally sound of the new entrants in 2010 - its comparative longevity is testimony to that. Manor is just the latest unfortunate casualty of a world of grand prix racing that currently chews up and spits out all but a few privileged teams. F1 is poorer for that. It has changed, as proven by Haas, but the loopholes that team exploited have now been shut down. If Manor's downfall helps vindicate the need for real change under F1's new owners, perhaps the team's efforts will have not been in vain.
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| By Scott Mitchell | |
| Features Editor |
Since joining the Formula 1 grid in 2010, the team latterly known as Manor has had three names and scored three points. It would be easy to reach the conclusion that F1 is no worse off without Manor, the last of the trio of new-in-2010 teams to fall. The 2017 grid will be filled by 20 cars from 10 teams, all of which are better prospects than Manor to challenge regularly in the midfield. Over seven seasons its car was always slower than the established teams. There was plenty of driver instability in the later years - Luiz Razia failing to come through with the money at the start of 2013, Roberto Merhi and Alexander Rossi seat-sharing in '15, and Rio Haryanto being dropped halfway though '16. So Manor drops off - it just means the worst team on the grid will, probably, be Sauber. And Sauber has got new backers, which means the new worst team on the grid is not only a well-established one but one that has a decent short-term future. No real loss, then. Manor never established itself as a stable entry; in a game of multi-millions it was hardly going to cut it and hardly befitting of what Formula 1 has grown into. And never did it threaten to do as Haas did in 2016. Now that is how you create a new F1 team. But, of course, Manor (as Virgin) entered F1 under a very different set of circumstances to Haas. A dropped budget cap and a flawed (but necessary) CFD-dependent car design meant the Virgin entry of 2010, spearheaded by Toyota refugee Timo Glock and GP2 frontrunner Lucas di Grassi, hardly hit the ground running. It was a far cry from the Dallara/Ferrari-assisted, well-funded, entered-a-year-later-than-planned Haas operation.
This looks to be the final chapter for Manor. And while it may not look like one on paper, it is a loss to Formula 1. Most obviously, two seats are off the table. It's easy to scoff at Manor being the modern Minardi (even though the Faenza squad still exists, technically, as Toro Rosso) or some other back-of-the-grid equivalent. But look at its drivers. Without Manor, highly rated Mercedes juniors Pascal Wehrlein and Esteban Ocon would not have made their grand prix debuts last year. Ditto Ferrari junior Jules Bianchi in 2013. In fact, Manor hardly recruited poorly on the driver front. Everyone was a junior single-seater race winner, if not a champion, right from its first pairing of di Grassi and Glock to the 'worst' line-up of Will Stevens and Merhi/Rossi in 2015. Digging deeper, and the 'worst team on the grid' has traditionally had a key part to play in presenting opportunities for talented young drivers. Big teams are conservative by nature and that makes it difficult for the best young talent to simply walk into a proper seat. Take the past two decades as a sample set, and a host of very talented - often serious junior title-winning - drivers made their debut at the wheel of the worst car on the grid that season (based on the final constructors' standings). Working backwards (and excluding Manor), there's Daniel Ricciardo at HRT in 2011. Toro Rosso gave chances to Jaime Alguersuari and Sebastien Buemi. Adrian Sutil first appeared with Force India in 2007. Minardi gave Gianmaria Bruni (2004), Mark Webber ('02) and Fernando Alonso ('01) their debuts.
Nick Heidfeld appeared for the first time in a Prost in 2000, Pedro de la Rosa drove for Arrows in 1999, while Jarno Trulli and Giancarlo Fisichella performed admirably for Minardi in '97 and '96 respectively. Yes, there are always going to be good and bad teams in F1, and - yes - someone always has to finish last. Wehrlein has found refuge with Sauber, which is encouraging, but look at the next crop of talent - there's no room at the inn for Pierre Gasly, Antonio Giovinazzi or Charles Leclerc at the moment. That's not to say Manor sticking around in 2017 would guarantee them a drive, but it would be another option. Haas, which has a technical partnership with Ferrari, ruled out Leclerc as a team-mate to Romain Grosjean on the grounds of experience. Circumstances played a part, but that wasn't a problem for Manor and Wehrlein or Ocon. The same argument applies to technical personnel - teams such as Manor give talented individuals a chance to show their worth. They might be new engineers and mechanics who have been given the opportunity to work for a grand prix team that might otherwise have been out of reach. Equally they could be like Dave Greenwood, the ex-BAR/Renault man who spent four years with Virgin/Marussia before being recruited by Ferrari when Marussia looked done-for at the end of 2014. Teams such as Manor offer opportunities. They can also be the source of an endearing storyline. While HRT and Caterham will likely be remembered poorly, Manor's rollercoaster existence had a hearty underdog plot. The likes of Force India and Williams are strong independent outfits fighting the good fight, so F1 has not been robbed of its option for a 'small team done good'. But the resilience shown by the Manor entry has been admirable. In some ways it's an accomplishment that Manor made it to seven seasons. Along with Lotus and HRT, the then-Virgin squad entered a world with a revenue distribution system not designed for 12 teams. 'Column 1' payments are equal payments for teams that finished in the top 10 of the constructors' championship for two of the past three years - so 2012 was the earliest for a bigger slice of the pie. 'Column 2' payments are on a sliding scale from first to 10th from the previous season's constructors' championship.
So the only regular money the new teams would get back from the championship would be a nominal $10million agreed as part of a new 'Column 3'. That's less than several teams get as part of individually agreed deals - like the constructors' championship bonus for Ferrari, Mercedes, Red Bull and McLaren. Or Ferrari's long-standing team payment. Or Williams's heritage bonus. Or Red Bull's payment for signing the new agreement first. Or Mercedes' bonus for meeting an agreed target of winning two titles. You get the picture. The deck was stacked against Virgin, Lotus and HRT in 2010. No wonder HRT folded at the end of 2012 and Lotus-turned-Caterham just about saw out the '14 season (by missing a couple of races towards the end). Virgin fought on, first as Marussia (2012-14, after investment from Andrei Cheglakov) and then Manor (when Stephen Fitzpatrick spearheaded its revival for 2015-16). But its best intentions were often hindered by horrific luck as a team. Test driver Maria de Villota lost her right eye and was left in a critical but stable condition following a crash in 2012. She passed in away in October 2013, and her family stated that it was a consequence of the injuries sustained in the accident. Then, a year later, came Bianchi's Japanese Grand Prix crash. The Frenchman delivered Marussia's greatest accomplishment when he scored points in the Monaco GP. But his accident in wet conditions at Suzuka left him in a coma, and he died the following year. Marussia raced on in Bianchi's memory, though like Caterham it hit serious financial issues at the end of 2014. It missed the final three races, but somehow secured new investment for 2015. Manor was 'born' - though it had no official links to its former Marussia owners, it had to retain the name for its chassis to qualify for the £30million Bianchi's Monaco points had earned it the previous year.
Manor failed to turn a wheel at the season-opening 2015 Australian Grand Prix and Stevens was withdrawn from the next race in Malaysia. Merhi started, though, and made the finish. And so the team continued for the rest of the year, even though it was a tough slog with a year-old car devoid of any meaningful updates for the new season. Writing off Manor as a shambles is an immature response, and one that ignores the fact that it seemed to be genuinely getting its house in order. The 2016 season was its most competitive - a Mercedes engine deal and a proper 'new' car helped Wehrlein scored a point, in Austria, and in terms of its performance relative to other teams it was the most credible in its seven-year existence. Comparing supertimes - the fastest lap from each team over a weekend expressed as a percentage - illustrates the progress from the beginning to the end. Excluding the anomalous 2015 dip, for the reasons outlined earlier, Manor consistently closed the gap to the pack ahead (Mercedes moved the overall goalposts for everybody in '14). Manor's competitive progressComparison of 'supertime' performance from 2010-2016.NB. 'Next-worst team' of those established before 2010If nothing else, Manor deserves credit for that impressive perseverance. Accidents and financial collapse have ruined plenty of teams over F1's history, so one outfit enduring a brace of both is, at best, severe misfortune. At its heart it was a solid race team that was far from a failure, even if on paper three points from 132 grand prix appearances is a paltry return. On a more basic human level, it is never desirable to see a team shut down. Around 100 employees were still working at the Manor base in Banbury at the start of this year, and unless they have something immediately lined up, that is a high number of talented individuals who are now out of work. It has wider ramifications for families, too. If you're feeling sentimental, you could argue F1 let Manor down by not doing more to rush to its aid after the financial issues that followed the desperately sad accidents of de Villota and Bianchi. But that's not really the responsibility of the other teams. Where the finger can be pointed is the harsh conditions Manor entered under, way back in 2010. Elite sport is supposed to be difficult, but it's not supposed to be impossible. If F1 wants to do anything to ensure that credible, deserving entries like Manor actually have chance to thrive, it effectively needs a blank sheet of paper. Revising the current financial system is one thing, but arguably the whole set-up needs a rewrite. Manor's biggest flaw was not having the sagacity to predict what was to come and say 'Actually, this is massively unrealistic'. Haas has shown what is possible if a new team enters F1 with the right support and under a sensible framework. That such a system did not exist several years ago is not really Manor's fault. Its collapse does not have the same roots as the failures of HRT or Caterham, for example. It was the most fundamentally sound of the new entrants in 2010 - its comparative longevity is testimony to that. Manor is just the latest unfortunate casualty of a world of grand prix racing that currently chews up and spits out all but a few privileged teams. F1 is poorer for that. It has changed, as proven by Haas, but the loopholes that team exploited have now been shut down. If Manor's downfall helps vindicate the need for real change under F1's new owners, perhaps the team's efforts will have not been in vain.
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