Niki Lauda will spend winter holidays planning about Mercedes – Formula 1 news
Niki Lauda, who is the former three times F1 champion and Mercedes AMG’s new non-executive chairman, has stated that he will be spending his winter vacation planning how to bring the team back on top.
“I am in England very often; right now just to analyse things. It is interesting that Michael Schumacher and Nico Rosberg were always in the top five at the beginning of the year, and we won in Shanghai,” Lauda said. “Everything was on track until suddenly
it was completely backwards. Together with Ross Brawn we have to ensure that never happens again. When everyone else is on vacation, I will use the time to do everything to bring Mercedes to the front again -- because that's where we belong.”
Lauda was appointed as the non-executive chairman for Mercedes in September this year and since then it is reported that he has the habit of arriving unannounced at the factory in Brackley, United Kingdom. Lauda has expressed his concern saying that there
is a lack of communication among the team members.
Mercedes AMG is the first F1 team from the company since 1955 after they bought Brawn GP. However, the team has failed to live up to the expectations of its fans despite having the talent of Schumacher who had returned from his first retirement with a three
year deal with the team. The team’s only Grand Prix victory to date remains the race win by Rosberg in China this past season. The main reason for the team’s failures has been reported to be a weaker car.
Along with Lauda becoming the part of the team, Mercedes will be going under some significant changes at the beginning of the 2013 F1 season. Lewis Hamilton had decided to leave his long term team McLaren to join Mercedes late in September and shortly after,
Schumacher announced his second and final retirement.
Another major change in the team occurred with Norbert Haug, who has been the in charge of all Mercedes activity for the last 22 years, announcing to step down from his position last week. There were no reasons cited but soon Haug confessed that he is stepping
down since he takes the responsibility for the failures of Mercedes in F1.
There were also reports that Lauda might have pushed Haug to make this decision which was immediately denied by Haug stating that there was no such issue. Former German F1 driver, Hans-Joachim Stuck, said that it was not Haug’s fault that Mercedes failed
to succeed in F1 but actually the responsibility was of the team principal, Ross Brawn.
For his part, Brawn has been promising to provide a better car to both Hamilton and Rosberg. He has also stated that they will be improving and that his claims are justified.
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