F1 Fanatic

> “Well, to be fair, Nik didn’t specify whose driving error it had to be!”

Ye I should have clarified and said ‘racing/driving incident’ as opposed to the engine failing underneath him. I did count it wrong with Spain this year though.

Thanks for the feedback everyone.

Btw I am thinking of setting up an online database for F1 which will have structured data and allow anybody to edit it. This little exercise got my thinking about it. Wikipedia is just text, you can’t really run queries against it and get anything interesting out of it. I looked around and couldn’t find a similar site, and I have built such a site for another industry which worked really well. I am sure that we could fill in all the relevant historical data pretty quickly :)

Nice work nik, they for sure will be the future like Senna Prost battle.

They have very different approach in F1 to me I think Vettel is just ahead of Hamilton but when they will finish their career I think we will see them on the top three great driver of all time relative to numbers of win behind Schumacher.

When Hamilton first started, I was delighted for him when he achieved 3rd on début in Melbourne and I was pleased to see him challenging Alonso and making the championship epic. But into 2008, where he expected to win every race, I started to go off him a little as I thought he was becoming rather haughty. I actually supported Massa in Brazil of that year rather than Hamilton to be honest. But to get to my point, what I have found wonderful is that out of something so bad – something so good has come. Let me explain: Last year he struggled with a horrible car, he was often heard cursing on the radio and he was furious that the team hadn’t provided him with a car capable of winning races, or at least challenging some of the other teams for points on some weekends. My opinion on him never really changed throughout last year – but this year, he has changed, he is a different person.

I think it took the misfortune of 2009 to bring him back down to earth and as a result, he is a much calmer and more mature driver; a better driver. He seems to handle the press a lot better now and looks to be a lot happier, which is good – as it means he is more comfortable doing what he is doing and enjoying it more. This year is as far as I see it, Lewis’ re-building year, where he is re-establishing himself as one of the best drivers on the grid. And even if he doesn’t win the championship this year, I think he has turned himself into the exact driver you would want to be to win future world championships. I am looking forward to some great battles between Lewis and Sebastian for many years to come.

@ nik

who will be Webber , Kubica & Schumacher!!!!!!!!!

Funily enough when you look at Jacques Villeneuve’s record in his first two years a lot of the stats are very similar to Hamilton’s

Thing is Lewis won’t go off to a new team with lots of money who ended up being useless.

BAR were the Man City of Formula One.

Hamilton is easily the better, more complete driver.

Vettel has a ton of raw pace but that’s pretty much all he’s got. His race craft is also poor and he seems to get rattled when he’s in the pack – a bit like a certain M.Schumacher would often do. It’s easy to forget he’s still very young and he’s probably some six or seven years off of his peak so I’m sure he’ll learn how to make to most of his strengths and minimise his weaknesses, something he doesn’t do at the moment. He’s also rather mollycoddled at Red Bull and I hope for his sake that if he ever goes to another top team he knows how to cope with not necessarily being the chosen one – I wouldn’t want him to have to learn in the hard way like Alonso did.

Hamilton is almost there as a well rounded racing driver – although his biggest strength (his racing instinct) is also probably his biggest weakness. I remember him being miffed at Singapore 2008 because the team told him not to risk attacking Rosberg and just collect the points. I thought he’d grasped the concept of the value of consistancy this year but the last couple of races seem to have shown otherwise.

> who will be Webber , Kubica & Schumacher!!!!!!!!!

To stretch the analogy – Webber -> Alan Jones (but more liked and less of a whinger)

and Kubica is at risk of becoming Martin Brundle if he doesn’t find himself a better drive :)

Schumi is Schumi