Solved

Speed bug, can't challenge

I have no concrete evidence of this but I too am wondering if something in the underlying game code has changed recently. I was also dominant in my league for many seasons winning both the team championship and 1-2 in drivers.
Because so many leagues have a dominant team I have long suspected that the game "favours" the previous season champions making it much easier for the team to retain the title. This suspicion was supported by the fact that I used to be able to win races without really trying. My cars would most often qualify at the front and be able to pull away from the field and win by quite a margin.
Last season things changed, I struggled in many races and at the end of the season I finished third in the team championship. There are a few theories that could explain this. It could be that the devs have tweaked something and if this is the case all I can say is "Good, the racing is much more interesting and enjoyable when you have to fight hard for the win".

On the other hand it could be that other managers have improved whereas I've stood still. With European summer arriving and rising temperatures maybe they are adapting their strategies better than me. I have been L20 for a while and can no longer improve my facilities whereas they are still developing and closing the gap. They may also have worked out better ways to distribute their DP and are using research more effectively.
One thing I won't do is move league because it has become more difficult, I'm enjoying the challenge.
BTW, I also had 10k rep until last season, the challenge now is to get back there.

When racing against equal level manager every single bit such as Tire and Fuel Economy in car attributes and Experience & mental skills for drivers are the key to get the best positions. There is also strategy, sometimes staying one more lap to overcut is a race winning move, sometimes having too much fuel in the final stint leads to bad pace and positions are lost.

What Kevin is experiencing in MJL is that his opponents are levelling up to 20 and finally being able to get perfect drivers (max skills), techology (DRS and Boost) and perfect design points (20 per race).

One last thing:
We shouldn't talk about HoF issues in this post, if someone want to start a discussion about it, please, create a new topic.

That might be part of the reason Gustavo but also... One of the managers in MJL is a close personal friend who levelled up to 20 a season before me. For the last ten or so seasons he has always finished behind me, I usually win the championship and he is usually second. Last season he became champion and I came third.
Auto-Pit cost me a lot of points in one of the races but that's not an excuse, my friend was consistently better than me, without the auto-pit nightmare I may have scraped a second place but I would never have beaten him.
I talk to him almost every day and it seems he didn't do anything different last season than he did all of the seasons before but still there was a significant swing in performance from my team to his.

There are another two crucial things I forgot to mention: KERS management and change CDs (from bad to good strengths)

What I'm trying to say is that iGP won't benefit a team just because has been dominating a League.

I wonder if in the old version teams had a morale stat depending on results compared to their abilities (rank/level)?

So after a relatively poor last season, this season I have paid a lot more attention to design, research and strategies. I have also concentrated a lot more during the race, thinking a bit more carefully about KERS and Push management. All of this extra focus appears to be paying dividends because I am currently lying equal first in the team championship with my good friend in third place 33 points behind.
It's only four races into the season so a bit early to draw any conclusions but I think it had been too easy for me in previous seasons so I wasn't paying enough attention to what I was doing.
I also notice that Alessandro is leading his championship and got a 2-4 in Spa last night. Not bad for a team suffering with poor performance LOL.

Alessandro took a commanding 1-2 today, so I have the impression the performance problems are solved :)
Maybe they jumped to me! I had a complete off day with 5th and 17th place ;)

Yep, just because you have a couple of bad races doesn't mean the game is bugged, you don't have to change league or stop playing the game completely.

Nik. The manager complaining about lack of pace is now over 80 points clear in the championship with only a few races to go. I wish my cars were as uncompetitive LOL.