F1 Fanatic

Or fans of Button or the McLaren team in general?

I ask because my guess is those two nations see Hamilton, his teammate and the team he’s in as their main rivals. McLaren right now is just about as British as it gets, with the constructor and both drivers being British.

My guess is most Spanish fans dislike him and the team because of the rivalry with Alonso in 2007 and Italy because Alonso is now in Ferrari, McLaren’s main rivals for decades.

I went to Silverstone last year and the Festival of Speed over the last weekend and just about everyone at both of these events were wearing McLaren gear. There were a few Red Bull fans too but hardly a peep out of Ferrari.

I’m just curious to see whether non-British F1 Fanatics are as patriotic, team loyal or driver loyal as the British seem to be at these events or whether they simply don’t care.

you know, not everyone is nationalist. Some people (british, italian, spanish, whatever) are actually intelligent enough to think the place of birth doesn’t actually matter (or to not believe in astrology or whatever)

I’m a British Australian and I love Sauber. Kobayashi is my driver of choice.

Over here, you can probably guess who the most popular driver on the grid is. His team are probably not so popular…

Because people can relate to sportsmen who share similar language, heritage and culture much more than someone who they don’t.

I can’t really say I’m a Hamilton fan, but surely I see he’s one of the best drivers in the world. But there are drivers I like more than Hamilton, for their racing as for their out-of-track behaviour.
I prefer Massa (Brazilian) than Trulli (Italian), although I like him. As I am a Ferrari fan I also support drivers who drive for Ferrari, but how much I do like them depends on me. If Massa went to McLaren I would want him to win every race, as I do now he’s at Ferrari. So if Lewis came to Ferrari I’d support him, maybe I would support his team mate more if I preferred him, but if I now don’t want him to win is because I want Massa/a Ferrari to win. This is the order of importance:
1 – Massa: I want Massa to win every race, not depending on which team he drives for.
2 – Ferrari: if Massa can’t win, I want a Ferrari driver to do so. Which of the two depends on my tastes. In 2011, I obviously prefer Massa to Alonso.

Some people (British, Italian, Spanish, whatever) are actually intelligent enough to think the place of birth doesn’t actually matter

As I said I like Massa, which is not of my same nationality, but: I’m Italian, and I want Italians to do well.
Nick Hamilton supports his brother, right? Why? Can’t he see Vettel is better (example)? But Lewis is his brother, is part of his family, and they have a close relationship. Therefore he likes Lewis more than others.
People of your same nationality are a little as your brothers. You have the same culture, traditions, language, uses. Especially when there are few of them in F1, they represent your nation in the sport. If they represent my nation, they somehow represent me. Of course if Liuzzi crashed on purpose into someone I’d blame him, but otherwise I want him to do well.
And I never liked Fisichella (until Spa 2009), even if he won more than Trulli and Liuzzi together.

There’s nothing wrong with patriotism. It’s when it becomes nationalism, when people start ignoring the flaws of their national representative and supporting them no matter how bad they are, that it gets a bit silly.

I try not to let nationality sway who I support too much, but obviously it’s difficult. I’m a fan of Hamilton and Button, but that’s also because they’re both great drivers who come across as decent people. If they were both complete idiots I’d like to think I wouldn’t support them merely because we were born in the same country.

I don’t like the ‘foreigners’ Alonso and Ferrari, because they both have a very dubious recent history, both are prone to fits of petulance, both have been known to exploit team orders, Alonso has shown disregard to yellow flags on several occasions and blackmailed his team boss, Ferrari sided with the F1 dictators in the mid 2000′s which did the sport no favours, etc etc. Again, I’d like to think I would dislike them for these reasons even if I was Spanish/ Italian, but I suppose I’ll never know…

On the other hand, I barely support the English football team because I think most of the players are unpleasant human beings, the manager is a grumpy prat who’s only in it for the money, and the sense of entitlement and unfounded optimism amongst English fans before each tournament tends to irk me!

Also, I remember reading in an issue of F1 Racing that at Monza one year there was a section of Italian fans who hated Ferrari (I’ll not repeat their chant but to give you a clue it involved alliteration) and no longer saw them as an Italian team but as a global team. These fans turned out to watch Toro Rosso who they felt represented them so patriotic fans can have very different outlooks on what makes a national team.

I think patriotic support depends a lot on skill
Brits are very lucky because we have three very talented drivers on the grid.

If however you look at Japan, They go bananas for Kobayashi, but maybe not so much for Yamamoto.

No one is going to support a driver that they can clearly see is less talented than the others.