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Would Kubica have been doing a better job? (29 posts)

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Girts said 10 months ago:

It’s really hard to know. First, it’s very possible that he would be driving for Ferrari now. Second, as @Kingshark pointed out, Heidfeld was actually often quicker when they were team mates even if Kubica had the upper hand in the BMW team in 2008, their most successful season.

On the other hand, it looked like Kubica had really matured as a great F1 driver in 2010, many experts considered him to be one of the best drivers of the year. What is more, Renault had already start to build the team around him. So, assuming that he still was with the same team today, I think the likelihood that he would have won at least one race, is pretty high. Unfortunately we’ll never know this, Kubica’s story seems to be one of the saddest ones in F1′s recent history.

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Younger Hamii said 10 months ago:

It’s a difficult thing to discuss about but obviously very debatable, something I made a topic about regarding Lotus at the end of last season. We need to take into account whether Kubica would’ve improved not only as a driver but also aided the development of the R31, which slowed quite considerably thus leading to Petrov calling the upgrades useless, potentially leading to his departure from the team ultimately.

If the latter was the case then Raikkonen & Grosjean wouldn’t have been in F1 now. In this newly-found parallel world, we cannot assume that Kubica will be the same driver as he was in 2010 as well as Petrov in both 2010 & 2011, we can only assume that the team & drivers would build on from the positives & negatives from recent seasons & come stronger, come stronger jumping to the conclusion that they would’ve still being competitive in 2012 however this is about If Kubica would have done a better job, to answer the question, better than Grosjean most certainly but Raikkonen is more questionable, personally yes but one of the most important things to note is that we’ll never find out & another to note, like I’ve mentioned above, would BOTH Raikkonen & Grosjean even be driving for the team this season? That’s one to answer.

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Funkyf1 said 10 months ago:

I think the issue is not the drivers, its the team. Lotus have a great car and two great drivers but have failed to capitalize on their strategies this year.

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raymondu999 said 10 months ago:

I wouldn’t entirely absolve the drivers of blame @Funkyf1 – there have been several opportunities which, in my view, were squandered by the drivers. Generally every opportunity they have to win a race is also squandered by the team – but the drivers have done their share of that too.

Would Kubica have done a better job? I doubt it. I think he’s overrated to be honest. Not that he’s a bad driver – far from it – but the way some people sometimes painting a picture of him that makes him look like F1′s best driver since Senna is an overrating IMO. Having a rookie teammate in 2010, being the undisputed No. 1 in the team and having (what was in my view) an underrated car also helped.

The car was quite selective in where it was strong too – which didn’t hurt

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tmekt said 10 months ago:

@raymondu999 I personally think that the drivers have done their absolute maximum – apart from the few single mistakes (e.g. Räikkönen’s qualification in Australia, Grosjean’s starts). The team seems a little amateurish in races (pit stops are too long, fatal strategic mistakes) which, considering their not-so-good performances in qualifications, leads to the fact that they aren’t winning. Everything would need to go perfectly.

Their performance was like that in Germany, Räikkönen would’ve won if there had been more retirements like there was in Valencia where Alonso did won pretty much in similar way.

EDIT: I’m a little biased though :)

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Keith Collantine said 10 months ago:

As a lot of people have said, it’s a moot point because it seems increasingly unlikely he will return. Which is a great pity.

I don’t think either of Lotus’s drivers have achieved the most they could have this year, for different reasons.

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raymondu999 said 9 months, 4 weeks ago:

@tmekt Unfortunately I’m not going to agree with you there. “few single mistakes” are a few too many, especially at this level of motorsport – and especially too many to say the drivers have achieved the maximum. I can think of a few racecraft mistakes as well that cost them points and results.

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tmekt said 9 months, 4 weeks ago:

@raymondu999 Kimi has scored four podiums, made points in every race except one and is still without an retirement. Most of the time his race pace has been pretty great. And all this considering the fact that he made a comeback this year after a two-year break (spent in WRC events, not on race circuits). Actually only one done better – result-wise – this year is Fernando Alonso and he’s truly on fire.

What it comes to Romain Grosjean, well, he pretty much started his Formula One career this year. Him being a novice – his results, to me, seem if not perfect but definitely good enough to say that he’s done his best.

I’m not denying the mistakes both drivers have made, just saying that their performances might be generally a bit overlooked taking the facts mentioned above into account.

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raymondu999 said 9 months, 4 weeks ago:

@tmekt When it comes to Romain I think it’s fair to excuse him of a few rookie mistakes. But you have to admit that there WERE rookie mistakes – they’re excused, but not forgotten. I don’t think, for example, that he should have tried diving down the inside of Vettel at the restart in Valencia – that cost him P2 and potentially the win.

Kimi has gotten podiums, but I don’t think that’s “the maximum.” There were some races where IMO he was quickest and should have won. For example, Bahrain. He misjudged overtaking Vettel and while he planned at first to dive down the inside, he was spooked and bailed out. Kimi admitted afterwards it was a mistake on his part and he should have looked around the outside. Mismanagement of KERS also potentially cost him more overtaking opportunities. He admitted that before he went up on the Bahrain podium, when he asked Vettel “were you using KERS out of the last corner?” and said something like “F*ck. I should have.”

I’m not saying they’re rubbish drivers – I’m not saying they’ve done a bad, or even average job. They’ve done above average – but not 100% for sure.

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tmekt said 9 months, 4 weeks ago:

@raymondu999 It seems that we disagree on what “doing your maximum” means. It would be pointless to ponder every ‘if’ you can possibly think of. If you did it that way nobody would ever be doing their 100%, not even this season’s Alonso.

Whether Kimi could’ve overtook Vettel if he had went for the outside: it might’ve been succesful, might’ve not. Nobody will ever know. We do know though that he started from the 11th position was able to finish 2nd by driving, Alonso’s similar victory in Valencia was because of Vettel and Grosjean (who still had all the chances of winning) retiring. Hell, even Kimi could have won there if Lotus’ pit-stops hadn’t been as slow as they were.

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raymondu999 said 9 months, 4 weeks ago:

@tmekt of course. They’re all humans – I never expect them to get the maximum all the time. I don’t think it’s humanly possible to get the maximum out of every race of a season. But that happens on a race by race basis. Has Alonso done his maximum? Not a chance. But he’s definitely the driver on this year’s grid that has come the closest to doing so.

Kimi has not done his maximum. Has he come close to it? “If” is the whole point of the game when you’re talking about “maximum” – because you’re talking IF they could have done better.

100% is a 100%, if you catch my drift – maybe someone comes close to it, maybe 99.9%, but unless that’s 100%, it’s not 100%.

Or… Let’s agree to disagree.

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tmekt said 9 months, 3 weeks ago:

@raymondu999

The way you describe it, it is humanly impossible to achieve maximum in ANY race. If you use ‘if’ sentences to review what could’ve been the ‘maximum’, the term becomes abstract and something that has nothing or very little to do with reality.

It is F1 driver’s job to pull his best from any given situation, and I think all drivers in the grid have done so. You might still fail but that doesn’t change the fact that you did your best.

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raymondu999 said 9 months, 3 weeks ago:

@tmekt of course it is. For example Kobayashi in Barcelona. he was in clear air and just getting dropped like a stone by the top 4 runners. Considering his pace – that was the maximum for him. Alonso in Canada – considering he was on the wrong strategy, he did the maximum, considering the state of his tyres and his underlying, “core” pace. Both cases – you have no “ifs” nor “buts” regarding whether or not the DRIVER – given his strategy on that day – could have done more.

If anyone wins a race – then obviously they achieved the maximum from their package, no matter what car they’re driving – because you can’t top a win.

I sort of define the maximum as being ahead of every car on the grid who, given the circumstances, strategy and track conditions, were slower than you.

“Trying your best” doesn’t make it the maximum. Sergio Perez tried his best to get the Malaysia win – he nearly binned it, and despite being 8 tenths quicker than Alonso AND having 3 attempts at a DRS pass, couldn’t pull it off. That was a driver who clearly (in my eyes) didn’t achieve the maximum.

I suppose it’s the engineer in me talking, but if you finish behind someone who’s slower – that’s not the maximum.

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Ral said 9 months, 3 weeks ago:

I think it’s interesting that with Lotus opting for two new drivers, it looks like they designed the car to be as flexible as possible and of a necessity tried to make sure they didn’t paint themselves into a corner regarding car set-up options. And it’s looking like that’s keeping them in it this year, as the car is relatively easy to drive and reacts well to setup changes.

If Kubica was still there and Lotus had designed the car with him in mind, who knows how much his natural preference for understeery cornering would have clashed with the Pirellis. If you consider how long it took Button and Massa to get to grips with the tyres, it may not have been as easy for Kubica as it might seem at first glance.

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