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What is truly a shame though is that Vettel broke all time records set by men who deserved those records using more driver skill then car advantage.
Let’s look at Ascari’s results in his nine race winning streak and see if it was his driving skill or “the car” which led to that streak.
1952 Belgium – won by 1 minute 55 seconds.
1952 France – won by more than a lap over the second placed car.
1952 Britain – won by more than a lap over the second placed car.
1952 Germany – won by 14 seconds.
1952 Dutch GP – won by 40 seconds.
1952 Italy – won by 1 minute two seconds.
1953 Argentina – won by more than a lap over the second placed car.
1953 Dutch GP – won by ten seconds.The runner-up in many of these races, and the runner-up in the 1952 season, was Ascari’s teammate, Nino Farina. In fact in only one of these nine races was the runner-up not one of Ascari’s teammates.
Based on his margin of victory and the performances of his teammates, Ascari’s Ferrari played a significantly larger role in his nine race winning streak than the RB9 did in Vettels.
I don’t agree that there’s been fewer incidents. There have been fewer spectacular incidents I suppose.
We saw Sutil and Maldonado crashing a few days ago. But maybe what is meant is incidents involving the big guns? Then off the top of my head, we had Alonso crash out against Vettel in Malaysia, Kimi crash out against VDG in Abu Dhabi, Alonso collided with both Webber and Kimi (IIRC) in India and finished out of the points, Hamilton picked up a punctures against Vettel in Japan and had to retire. If we count RoGro as a big gun he’s been involved in a few crashes as well, though in the first half of the season. The same is true for Webber.
Given the way the season has unfolded the incidents have been fairly unimportant. If there had been a close title race the same events would seem much more significant. For instance if Alonso had been tied on points with SV after Suzuka his incidents in India would take on crucial importance, as his crash in Japan did last season.
None of the above, any European country wanting to host f1 would have to build a new track for the purpose. Kingshark has pointed out the defects in the existing contenders. Even the Red Bull Ring (note the correct name) is not a great F1 circuit. I like the concept of a French GP, but it needs somebody to build a suitable track in France.
I expected more from Hamilton this year than he’s shown so far. Rosberg had a win and a second place last year, so at the start of this season I expected two or three wins for Lewis. The downside of being an elite driver – and I count LH as such – is that much more is expected of you. You have to deliver exceptional performances in at least every other race. By that lofty standard he’s underperformed this year. In fact despite the points table I think Rosberg has been the better Merc driver overall to this point, he’s just had all the mechanical problems.
LH has never come to grips with the “designed to degrade” Pirelli tyres. Maybe next years more durable tyres will suit hm better and we’ll see the Hamilton of 2007 -10 again.
I don’t blame them, but I just cannot buy into the argument that it isn’t an advantage
How can it be an advantage if everyone does it? By definition any advantage one driver gains is cancelled out by other drivers doing the same thing and getting the same advantage.
And this isn’t anything new, at most GP’s you can see most (all?) of the drivers going off the track at some point in qualifying.
Based on their two seasons together I have to rate this a draw. They were equally good, though they had different ways of getting their very similar results. I’m partial to the Senna style of winning but I can understand why some favor Prost. We see the same split today over whether it reflects better on a driver to win from pole or from further down the grid. But that’s a style thing more than anything else.
Of course it all depends on how you want to define “best”. Some seasons a driver is dominant , other seasons he displays a lot of grit and has to fight through adversity. 2012 was a great season for both Alonso and Vettel in terms of overcoming adversity, but not really their best overall season.
Lewis Hamilton: 2007
Kimi Raikonnen: 2005
Fernando Alonso: 2006
Jenson Button: 2011
Sebastian Vettel: 2013I recall from a “Top Five Race Wins” thread that none of Alonso’s WDC year wins (other than San Marino 2005) made most peoples lists. It’s curious that he gets more respect for finishing runner up to Vettel than for beating Schumacher.
This inability to engage Vettel after turn 1 must be driving all the other drivers nuts.
Along with a sizable slice of the fan base!
It’s always been this way in F1 though. One team, and usually one driver, wins for a number of years before somebody else comes along. And those race wins tend to be “easy”. Half of all Senna’s race wins consisted of his leading the race from start to finish. Vettel has been making things very exciting by comparison.
Lewis wants to be in the race. He doesn’t want to accidentally win by some strategic call or because his car is just way faster.
Come on now, it’s obvious that he would give his eye teeth for any win of any sort. Which is a good trait in a racing driver, but lets not swallow his self-serving nonsense about how he’d turn up his nose at an easy win. I like him as a driver, but he can’t seem to open his mouth without putting his foot in it. “Higher caliber” indeed.
Everyone thought Villeneuve was the next big thing
It’s funny you should mention Villeneuve, as the parallels between him and Hamilton are uncanny. Both were thought of as the next big thing. Both had outstanding rookie seasons, both finishing second in the WDC in only their first year. Both won four race in their first season. Both won the WDC in only their second year in F1. Both finished fifth in their third year. Both changed their drives for big money to a wealthy new team.
Villeneuve gets a bad rap, he was a talented driver but he moved for money instead of for the best car.
he is in the top 15 greatest f1 drivers in history
He was ranked 15th on a BBC list of the 20 greatest F1 drivers a few years ago. Of course that list also had Alonso tenth and Vettel eighth.
I can’t fault Hamilton for believing that. As a top F1 driver, he has to believe that he’s at least as good as (and hopefully better than) any other driver.
I can fault him for not shutting up about it though. (And I mean “not shutting up” – he seems simply incapable of giving an interview without moaning about Vettels car and how great he thinks it is) He comes across as petty, mean-spirited and jealous. Reputedly he’s a church-going Christian so he could ask his priest about pride and envy.
There was a painter named Claude Monet who spent his entire career painting water-lilies. You remind me a bit of that painter, Michael. Do you have anything to say on the subject of F1 which is not some variation of “Grrr, I don’t like that Vettel”? Thoughts on “Taxi-gate” perhaps? On the new technical regs for next year? There is much more to F1 than the one individual you are fixated on.
Perhaps it only seemed to you that the camera was not paying much attention to SV because he looms so very large in your own mind?
I’m not sure what TV coverage you were looking at, but he got plenty of coverage that I saw. At least as much as Alonso or Rosberg. Keep grasping at straws, Michael.
But could we have the same topic regarding Ferrari for comparison?
No. For most problems less than a mechanical DNF the main source of information is the radio communication with the drivers. And the radio transmissions between Alonso and his engineer are virtually never released for some reason. So it would be impossible to do a similar list for Ferrari.
