Are all of you seeing the comments by Jackie Stewart? I can remember back when Hamilton beat JS's win number and he had to pipe up and say LH wasn't that great for this reason or that. like the cars were harder to drive and more dangerous, blah blah blah. He comes across as a bitter old man trying to protect his legacy by tearing down anybody who comes along that might overshadow it. His latest comments include saying that back in his day, everybody ran Cosworth DFV's (except Ferrari) so the competition was much closer but I would like to point out, as examples, the 1970 and 2019 British GP. In 1970, even though "everybody" ran Cosworth DFV, the field was separated by 8 seconds in Qualifying, but in 2019 the gap was 3 seconds from quickest to slowest. And in the 1970 race, only 10 out of 25 drivers finished and the winner lapped the last car still running at the end 11 times. Does this sound more competitive than todays Formula 1? Jackie just can't compliment Lewis and leave it at that, it's always gotta be "Lewis is a really good driver, but not one of the Greats". Ugh!
In reply to loosecannon :
Met Jackie back a long time ago (not like handshake and drinks- at a big event)- he came across like, well, and arrogant SOB. Some of the women engineers that also met him had more stories about him.... I came out not all that impressed with his character.
Great driver, no question.
I will add that Jackie isn't the only one who thinks that the era is such a competitive one. The reality is that one or two cars were really capable of winning on a regular basis, and that winning by over a min was a regular thing. Seems like the idea of starting an F1 team (or Indycar or CanAm) in your garage makes the era more appealing- even when the actual racing was horrible.
loosecannon said:
Are all of you seeing the comments by Jackie Stewart? I can remember back when Hamilton beat JS's win number and he had to pipe up and say LH wasn't that great for this reason or that. like the cars were harder to drive and more dangerous, blah blah blah. He comes across as a bitter old man trying to protect his legacy by tearing down anybody who comes along that might overshadow it. His latest comments include saying that back in his day, everybody ran Cosworth DFV's (except Ferrari) so the competition was much closer but I would like to point out, as examples, the 1970 and 2019 British GP. In 1970, even though "everybody" ran Cosworth DFV, the field was separated by 8 seconds in Qualifying, but in 2019 the gap was 3 seconds from quickest to slowest. And in the 1970 race, only 10 out of 25 drivers finished and the winner lapped the last car still running at the end 11 times. Does this sound more competitive than todays Formula 1? Jackie just can't compliment Lewis and leave it at that, it's always gotta be "Lewis is a really good driver, but not one of the Greats". Ugh!
#nailedit
Almost all the negative comments I read about Hamilton seem to be tied to his "personality" off the track.
alfadriver (Forum Supporter) said:
In reply to loosecannon :
Met Jackie back a long time ago (not like handshake and drinks- at a big event)- he came across like, well, and arrogant SOB. Some of the women engineers that also met him had more stories about him.... I came out not all that impressed with his character.
Great driver, no question.
I will add that Jackie isn't the only one who thinks that the era is such a competitive one. The reality is that one or two cars were really capable of winning on a regular basis, and that winning by over a min was a regular thing. Seems like the idea of starting an F1 team (or Indycar or CanAm) in your garage makes the era more appealing- even when the actual racing was horrible.
I guess that was through work right? Everyone I know who worked with him at Ford said the same thing, he's an egotistical, arrogant ass. But I wont necessarily criticize him for that. I think to a certain extent you need to have that kind of self belief to make it to the top in racing. He was my hero as a young kid. I read everything I could he wrote as a younger teen as well. Three WDC's seemed just such an unimaginable feat, especially in his day. These days he doesn't even register in my top five, maybee not not ten if I bother to think it though.
In reply to Adrian_Thompson (Forum Supporter) :
Yup. Pretty cool. And given that this is more about his character than his driving, well....
He's welcome to his opinion that he does not rank Lewis among the greats. I very much think he is wrong. Does not take away from his driving skill or accomplishments. It does remind us that his "golden age" of racing wasn't all that great for constant wheel to wheel, and dominant cars were dominant. His era was as much about reliability as speed.
In reply to loosecannon :
I read Jackie's autobiography, The preparation today compared to then is so much different. He talked about drinking a coke before a race, honestly the only driver in the current paddock that might do that is Kimi. The cars are so precise and reliable now, compared to the death traps jackie raced, of course the present day cars are close, but are more technology then driver. In 8 years he won 3 championship probably could have won more or died if not for the political statement of safety, Comparing the times is like comparing what music you like the best, Jackie is entitled to his opinion. Hamilton has always been on a good team even during the end at Mclaren he still had a better car then most and the leap to Mercedes was a great choice, would we even have a conversation if he would have stayed? I also think it's a hard debate on Jackie's top 3 Picks is Clark, Senna, and Fangio. Who do you eliminate for Hamilton? Honestly I would eliminate one for Schumi before Hamilton. I agree with Jackie, when you think about Senna it wasn't only fighting on the track it was fighting the FIA and all the politics and wining in cars that early in his career were not great. Senna beating Prost was entertaining. Jim Clark won the World Championship in 1963 and 1965, the Indy 500 in 1965, finished second in his class at Le Mans in 1959 and third overall in 1960, something that will not be repeated and obviously the danger of driving was much higher. Fangio was able to do something schumi was able to do which was build a team and win. Maybe when Hamilton is retired we can see beyond the dominate statistics. 10-20 years from now when robots are racing or everything is just simulators probably have the same conversation on how dangerous it was.
Jackie Stewart did a lot for driver safety and has a lasting legacy because of it. His opinions on rating drivers other than himself are not as important but they make clicks and get him in the news.
I think trying to compare drivers who raced 40 years apart is futile. The cars still have four tires; they're round, black, and hanging out in the breeze, but almost everything else is different. Aside from the things people have already mentioned (speed, safety, reliability), F1 of the 70s was barely out of the level of "gentleman racing", nothing approaching the corporate professionalism with attention paid to every single detail that it is now (well, for most teams at least). The level of physical fitness required is vastly different as well, there's the line about the old days when "the drivers were fat and the tires were skinny".
Most of the statistics used to make records are invalid across a span of decades. Number of wins, podiums, poles, etc depends heavily on how many races we have per season which has more than tripled since F1 started. Number of points is even less relevant with the changes in the points system. You can't even really compare Schumacher and Hamilton who are only separated by 20 years. Number of championships avoids most of that, but the huge increase in reliability has helped the dominant teams be more consistently dominant, so even that throws off the number.
I read half the interview with Stewart. I think some websites may have taken his words out of context. The main point I got was that he felt the racing is so different between the old greats and the new greats that he shouldn't rank them. But then he says that the fact that Jim Clark and his era raced Grand Prix, tin tops, indy, and anything else and won then he would have to say they are better than Hamilton just for lack of Hamilton racing multiple types of cars and series and winning.
Which is fair.
So by his hypothesis, Schumacher would fail to meet grade the same as Hamilton, and Vettel too.
I may starting to think that the biggest shake up of this season's race results is the fixed tire allocation. If you know your car likes hard tires at Monza you can't have five sets in the garage. Instead the teams have to baby and hoard or try to shift the car to like the mediums and sorts just because you have less risk that way.
Maybe they should have agreed to three hards total and one less soft set.
The ring looks to be another weather induced challenge for the teams this weekend. I wonder if McLaren will get a podium from just pace.
Hopefully the weather will give us some randomness. Not that we've really been missing it this year, but rain and cold temps will definitely change things up. Maybe not so much on the top step of the podium, though.
Seems like the weather is going to take the hards and make them concrete, the mediums and make them hard, and the softs medium. The pre-race show speculated that this will be a weekend where all 5 tires will be used, and then quickly dismissed the hards as nobody will get them to work.
Not sure if I'll be able to watch live- going camping- but it certainly looks that the weather combination will make things VERY unusual and variable. The interesting one will be is Ferrari- on one hand, the conditions will mute the power difference, and on the other, the aero issues will make getting tire heat really hard. I think Merc and Red Bull will have a decent solution.
We haven't been at this track in 7 years, the cars are way different, we're not getting any practice AND it might rain during the race. This might be the most chaotic race of the season. Russell on the podium?
alfadriver (Forum Supporter) said:
Seems like the weather is going to take the hards and make them concrete, the mediums and make them hard, and the softs medium. The pre-race show speculated that this will be a weekend where all 5 tires will be used, and then quickly dismissed the hards as nobody will get them to work.
Not sure if I'll be able to watch live- going camping- but it certainly looks that the weather combination will make things VERY unusual and variable. The interesting one will be is Ferrari- on one hand, the conditions will mute the power difference, and on the other, the aero issues will make getting tire heat really hard. I think Merc and Red Bull will have a decent solution.
The Mercedes seems to work its tires harder than the other cars, so it may have an easier time getting them to temp. Not what the other teams want to hear, but it's the flip side of that hot weather tire degradation. Throw Lewis' wet weather abilities in there and it's not looking good for everyone else.
Ignoring crashes, I predict that Lewis will run away from the rest of the field. Max will come in second with a large gap to third. And something really random will happen below that.
Story on the F1 website:
Mercedes will not be supplying engines to Red Bull, citing the fact that they already supply four teams and are reaching the limits of their production abilities. Good excuse, although I'm sure they're in no hurry to have Horner turn on them when he fails to dominate.
Ferrari says "they haven't asked and it would be hard but it's something we could consider but we have made no decision and (carries on as Italian)"
Renault" Ha ha ha ha ha aaaaaah ha ha ha. No, they have not asked and I expect it will be a cold day in hell before they do".
Keith Tanner said:
alfadriver (Forum Supporter) said:
Seems like the weather is going to take the hards and make them concrete, the mediums and make them hard, and the softs medium. The pre-race show speculated that this will be a weekend where all 5 tires will be used, and then quickly dismissed the hards as nobody will get them to work.
Not sure if I'll be able to watch live- going camping- but it certainly looks that the weather combination will make things VERY unusual and variable. The interesting one will be is Ferrari- on one hand, the conditions will mute the power difference, and on the other, the aero issues will make getting tire heat really hard. I think Merc and Red Bull will have a decent solution.
The Mercedes seems to work its tires harder than the other cars, so it may have an easier time getting them to temp. Not what the other teams want to hear, but it's the flip side of that hot weather tire degradation. Throw Lewis' wet weather abilities in there and it's not looking good for everyone else.
Ignoring crashes, I predict that Lewis will run away from the rest of the field. Max will come in second with a large gap to third. And something really random will happen below that.
I think the RB is going to be super-tricky to drive in these conditions and it will be a Merc 1-2, with an outside shot at a podium for whomever else!!
I agree the RB is going to be super-tricky to drive, so we'll probably see a big gap between the two RB drivers. Again.
Max is really getting more out of that car than he should and he seems to be able to handle a squirrely chassis.
Keith Tanner said:
I agree the RB is going to be super-tricky to drive, so we'll probably see a big gap between the two RB drivers. Again.
Max is really getting more out of that car than he should and he seems to be able to handle a squirrely chassis.
I do wonder sometimes if Max would be faster if the car was setup for Albon or Gasly. Max may "like" a certain car but maybe that isn't the fastest way to go for him.
I think RB may get beaten by both racing points. As much as Stroll gets hate, IIRC he is good in the rain. Perez is generally good. So it may be Hamilton for the win, then 2-3 for Racing Point. Ricciardo will be 4th again. And oddly both Williams will be in the points.
Oh forgot to say Max tries some crazy line through turn two and crashes into Bottas.
i was listening to the pre-show was surprised to hear that Will Buxton is still not able to come to track after 2 weeks of covid, I hope he is getting better. They talked about how Sergio is going to make his decision soon. Interesting to have a driver controlling his destiny regardless if he has the funds to. Sad that Mick didn't get a shot at practice, I am sure that Gio took a deep breath.
In reply to Keith Tanner :
Watched the coverage of non FP2 and they interviewed Ciril, who got a call at the beginning of the interview. They jokingly asked if that was Helmut or Christian. His reaction was funny, but it appears they are ready to supply them if RB does not get the Honda IP and license.
In reply to alfadriver (Forum Supporter) :
They don't really have a choice from what I understand of the regulations.
Rain.
