Greatest British F1 Driver?

[BradSpeedMan 6]

http://gptoday.com/full_story/view/620602/Is_Lewis_Hamilton_Britain8217s_greatest_F1_driver/

I think so. He's not my favourite, but I rate him just slightly touching Vettel, who's arguably still the best out there... I'm not just referring to his achievements in breaking records, he is just...a great racing driver

Flawed in character, but just great in the car, a pleasure to watch in terms of racecraft. Genius' all have that mix. 

[Sakae 0]

You are a better man than I am, Brad.

[lipstick79 0]

Statistically the, greatest British driver IS Hamilton.
Though, the GREATEST British driver to the public IS 
Our Nige - Nigel Mansell.
Who raced against arguably the GREATEST - Ayrton Senna - and BEATING him.
Taking the ?92 WDC ?

To be a GREAT, you are ONLY as good as your competition.

[BradSpeedMan 6]

He is racing againts Vettel, makes it better than Senna

[Sakae 0]

34 minutes ago, BradSpeedMan said:

He is racing against Vettel, makes it better than Senna

20 October 2017   9:46 (CEST)

That's fine, and I am not sure how many people actually realize that this year is culminating into one of the closest racing season in very long time (maybe ever). We need more of it. Six to eight cars fighting in narrow tip-top zone is good enough for me.

Back to OP, I am getting tired of so much is made of this driver, whose accomplishments for past two WDC were with W05, W06, whilst he has lost with W07 and people choose to forgive and forget. My interest in F1 was ignited in Kyalami 1974, and I've remained glued to the sport ever since with most excruciating intimacy, yet I have never seen or maybe I cannot remember that much was ever made of uncompetitive (even cheap) WDC crowns.  Even in his time with McLaren I was not impressed with him as some other fans on this forum are. I am not attempting to start food fight in the canteen, but that's where I am, unimpressed. 

[BradSpeedMan 6]

58 minutes ago, Sakae said:

20 October 2017   9:46 (CEST)

That's fine, and I am not sure how many people actually realize that this year is culminating into one of the closest racing season in very long time (maybe ever). We need more of it. Six to eight cars fighting in narrow tip-top zone is good enough for me.

Back to OP, I am getting tired of so much is made of this driver, whose accomplishments for past two WDC were with W05, W06, whilst he has lost with W07 and people choose to forgive and forget. My interest in F1 was ignited in Kyalami 1974, and I've remained glued to the sport ever since with most excruciating intimacy, yet I have never seen or maybe I cannot remember that much was ever made of uncompetitive (even cheap) WDC crowns.  Even in his time with McLaren I was not impressed with him as some other fans on this forum are. I am not attempting to start food fight in the canteen, but that's where I am, unimpressed. 

Each to their own then. Although his last 2 championships were on the back on a dominant car, I think he's immensely talented

[VicVenom 0]

On 19/10/2017 at 1:04 PM, Sakae said:

You are a better man than I am, Brad.

9 hours ago, Sakae said:

 

Back to OP, I am getting tired of so much is made of this driver, whose accomplishments for past two WDC were with W05, W06, whilst he has lost with W07 and people choose to forgive and forget. My interest in F1 was ignited in Kyalami 1974, and I've remained glued to the sport ever since with most excruciating intimacy, yet I have never seen or maybe I cannot remember that much was ever made of uncompetitive (even cheap) WDC crowns.  Even in his time with McLaren I was not impressed with him as some other fans on this forum are. I am not attempting to start food fight in the canteen, but that's where I am, unimpressed. 

Anyone who isn't Vettel is s##t. You already told us. 

On 19/10/2017 at 0:58 PM, BradSpeedMan said:

 

I think so. He's not my favourite, but I rate him just slightly touching Vettel, who's arguably still the best out there...

Vettel is barely top 5 on the grid. 

[VicVenom 0]

10 hours ago, Sakae said:

My interest in F1 was ignited in Kyalami 1974, and I've remained glued to the sport ever since with most excruciating intimacy, yet I have never seen or maybe I cannot remember that much was ever made of uncompetitive (even cheap) WDC crowns.  

You are over 40? Yet you still worship another man? And I thought BradSpeedMan was bad. Jesus christ. 

[radical-one 0]

Mercedes is the greatest car for 3 years. 

That's a more appropriate statement....

[Ruslan 0]

I think I would have to rate Jim Clark and Stirling Moss ahead of Lewis Hamilton. Would have to rate Hamilton ahead of one my all-time favorites, Nigel Mansell, and probably also ahead of Jackie Stewart.

[Publius Cornelius Scipio 0]

4 hours ago, Ruslan said:

I think I would have to rate Jim Clark and Stirling Moss ahead of Lewis Hamilton. Would have to rate Hamilton ahead of one my all-time favorites, Nigel Mansell, and probably also ahead of Jackie Stewart.

I think that Jim Clark was on a league of his own. Stirling Moss was an excellent driver but one of the several excellent drivers. Jackie Stewart is a smart chap, the first modern F1 driver, but I remember reading an interview when he was talking about Clark and he was saying that he went to Clark talking about his performance and said "I took that corner (I forgot which one...) in 4th at so and so rpm" and Clark apparently answered him "why didn't you take it flat?", that IMHO is the proof that a guld is separating Clark from Stewart. Regarding Mansell, he's a great charachter and apparently had a fantastic car control at the limit, but he was overshadowed by Elio De Angelis (who IMHO in terms of raw talent was miles ahead of Mansell, the problem was that De Andelis was not very lucky and a nice chap in a sport full of predators) and in his early days of his second stint with Williams by Patrese. Also if I remember correctly when PAtrese broke his car in qualy and was given Mansell's car he was over a second faster than him.

Having said that I think that Hamilton is an excellent driver, outstanding probably, but IMHO he is a sore loser and a bad winner and he has always received so much outside help that it's difficult to properly assess his overall standing, but he's certainly very very near the top 

[radical-one 0]

5 hours ago, Ruslan said:

I think I would have to rate Jim Clark and Stirling Moss ahead of Lewis Hamilton. Would have to rate Hamilton ahead of one my all-time favorites, Nigel Mansell, and probably also ahead of Jackie Stewart.

Agreed

[Massa 0]

People tend to fall into two camps: biased for the old days or biased for the modern times.

Those biased for the old times are wrong because the olden days of F1 were filled with ride-buying amateurs, people who started driving when they were 25 or 30 years old, racing for s##tty teams put together in a barn with no hope in hell.  The fields were extremely weak.  Moreover, "old" bias makes people think that if they can visually see the drivers "working harder," that must mean they were, without considering that while the cars moved around more, they were also phenomenally slower, and required much less physicality than the downforce of today demands—you did not need to be in shape to drive those cars, and if you think they worked harder in the 50s or 60s, you should watch NASCAR road racing or touring cars, because that is low downforce, high movement racing, and sure enough, that is where drivers are successful in old age with zero athleticism.  Just like F1 was!

Those biased for the new times have some support.  The fields are full of professionals, people who started racing when they were 4, who have never done a single thing in their life that wasn't this.  Even the worst team is a hugely funded, professional enterprise.  The percent difference from pole to last has never been smaller.  The ladders are fully developed now, and drivers get weeded out early, while amateurs no longer buy an F1 car to drive, but rather race in GT cars as the required am paired with a pro who does the work.  Sure, some great talents lack the funding to advance, and get lost, while others with big backing get to F1 with more ease, but there are no amateurs racing, and even highly funded drivers are usually winners in some important ladder series—the ones who aren't never can buy a seat, and the ones who really suck eventually get bounced.

But the new bias also has a downfall, which is that we better remember things we saw more recently, and so it's easier to remember the nuance of what Hamilton or Vettel or Alonso or Räikkönen do and praise it than it is to remember older drivers, especially for those of us who didn't see every single Grand Prix ever run.

Still, the old F1 was largely a hobby that a few people managed to make work.  The current F1 is largely work that a few people manage to make fun.  The "fun" of old times makes nostalgia for them cloud our evaluation of those drivers because we feel that if we enjoyed it, it must have truly been the best.  Take a lot of "the greats" in their absolute prime and develop them up the GP3, F3, F2 ladder, and put them in an F1 car, and I think you'd see them be very exposed.

There's a similar phenomenon with the sports car supremacists, for example, who talk about LMP1 racing is the purset, and what F1 should be, always have a lot of excuses when a guy like Brendon Hartley shows up in an F1 car and looks lost, even though it should be obvious that a guy who had a ticket punched to F1 by Red Bull but blew it by never winning in the junior leagues of open-wheel got shipped off to sports cars because it's below F1 in caliber.  We also see this with IndyCar bias; IndyCar drivers have largely been miserable in F1, with few exceptions (all of which are easily explained), and IndyCar drivers have largely been miserable in NASCAR, yet when a NASCAR driver who had never driven an open-wheel car of any kind came to the Indy 500 a few years ago, he was fast all month and finished sixth.  And we all saw what happened when Alonso came over this year.

Just because you enjoy(ed) something more does not mean that it was better, and that's okay—you're allowed to enjoy worse drivers or slower cars or this or that; I love IndyCar but openly admit the driver lineup is absolute garbage and the cars are underwhelming and the race strategists and engineers are idiots.  That's actually why it's kind of fun.

[Sakae 0]

16 hours ago, radical-one said:

Mercedes is the greatest car for 3 years. 

That's a more appropriate statement....

23 October 2017   17:00 (CEST)

radical-one, as much as I agree with you (probably 4 years), yet it is half of the story. Significant and most trouble is a story of technical restrictiveness which destroyed everything WCC ever stood for. From premature homologation of new technology, right up to token system, which allowed two drivers to strive, and all of the others to struggle. How MB or their drivers can be proud of victories under those conditions we will never know, but apparently they are.   

[Publius Cornelius Scipio 0]

1 hour ago, Massa said:

People tend to fall into two camps: biased for the old days or biased for the modern times.

Those biased for the old times are wrong because the olden days of F1 were filled with ride-buying amateurs, people who started driving when they were 25 or 30 years old, racing for s##tty teams put together in a barn with no hope in hell.  The fields were extremely weak.  Moreover, "old" bias makes people think that if they can visually see the drivers "working harder," that must mean they were, without considering that while the cars moved around more, they were also phenomenally slower, and required much less physicality than the downforce of today demands—you did not need to be in shape to drive those cars, and if you think they worked harder in the 50s or 60s, you should watch NASCAR road racing or touring cars, because that is low downforce, high movement racing, and sure enough, that is where drivers are successful in old age with zero athleticism.  Just like F1 was!

 

I happened to watch a video of Jim Clark driving a Lotus Cortina a few years ago, that made me change my mind on him

Regarding drivers in the old days you are right that many were buying a car, setting up thjeir own team, etc, just think of people like Silvio Moser (who I truly respect), but the sport was far less professional that it is now, when I was racing go karts drivers had their karts on top of their fathers' cars and if something wasn't quite right you would kick it until you fix it, nowadays it is unbelievable, they have teams, they have sponsors, mechanics, engineers, it's bonkers, but I still think that people like Stefano Modena, Mike Wilson or Tony Fullerton were exceptional talents, you would see them do things that the others couldn't achieve (even the mighty Ayrton Senna). The fact that the sport was less professional doesn't mean that the drivers were less skilled, some where, others were not. IMHO the main difference is experience, nowadays each F1 driver is very experienced when he enters F1, in the old days it was not like that, they used to make mistakes that nowadays no even an F3 driver makes, but inexperienced doesn't mean less talented. And by the same token old driver doesn't mean more talented, but still Jim Clark stands out, same as Senna or Prost or Fangio or IMHO Gilles Villeneuve (I saw him do things that I've never seen anyone else be able to do). Irrespecive of what we like Hamilton will be remembered in the future for his skill, each generation had its fair share of exceptional talents, the point is that only a few times drivers have been able to raise above "exceptional"

[Ruslan 0]

On ‎10‎/‎23‎/‎2017 at 4:41 AM, Publius Cornelius Scipio said:

I think that Jim Clark was on a league of his own. Stirling Moss was an excellent driver but one of the several excellent drivers. Jackie Stewart is a smart chap, the first modern F1 driver, but I remember reading an interview when he was talking about Clark and he was saying that he went to Clark talking about his performance and said "I took that corner (I forgot which one...) in 4th at so and so rpm" and Clark apparently answered him "why didn't you take it flat?", that IMHO is the proof that a guld is separating Clark from Stewart. Regarding Mansell, he's a great charachter and apparently had a fantastic car control at the limit, but he was overshadowed by Elio De Angelis (who IMHO in terms of raw talent was miles ahead of Mansell, the problem was that De Andelis was not very lucky and a nice chap in a sport full of predators) and in his early days of his second stint with Williams by Patrese. Also if I remember correctly when PAtrese broke his car in qualy and was given Mansell's car he was over a second faster than him.

Having said that I think that Hamilton is an excellent driver, outstanding probably, but IMHO he is a sore loser and a bad winner and he has always received so much outside help that it's difficult to properly assess his overall standing, but he's certainly very very near the top 

Well......I think you underrate Nigel Mansell. He did win over 30 GPs and with a little luck could have had 3 or 4 world championships. I think for several years, he was the most winning driver in F1. That said, he was not the caliber of Prost and Senna and had to race against them. He did prove to be a match for three-times world champion Piquet (and Rosberg).

On the other hand, I have no problem with the claim that Elio De Angelis may well have been a better driver that Mansell. He was certainly a great driver that never achieved great results. When they were paired, there is no question De Angelis held the edge of Mansell (but later Senna had the edge over him). On the other hand, I do think Mansell got better (faster) after he went to Williams. He was one of these guys that developed into a better driver during his years in F1 (which actually is kind of rare).

I heard a different version of a similar conversation between Stewart and Clark. Stewart said something like "I was right on the limit in the corner, and started to loose it, but was able to recover." Clark asked "If you were on the limit, then how could you recover it?" Anyhow, Stewart has always maintained that Clark was better than him.

 

[Ruslan 0]

On ‎10‎/‎23‎/‎2017 at 10:51 AM, Massa said:

Those biased for the old times are wrong because the olden days of F1 were filled with ride-buying amateurs, people who started driving when they were 25 or 30 years old, racing for s##tty teams put together in a barn with no hope in hell.  The fields were extremely weak.....Those biased for the new times have some support.....

Agree in general. But, the drivers in 1950s and 1960s were not just running F1. They ran multiple series and they ended up running a lot of races. If you want to know why so many people are convinced that Stirling Moss in the one of the greatest of all time, you need to look beyond his F1 races (although when he retired he was the second winniest F1 driver of all time). He was clearly showing himself to be the fastest driver in sports cars races and virtually everything else he ran. He drove a lot of races back then, and certainly the spear points of the fields were competitive, even if the field in general was weaker further back. On the other hand, current F1 has 2-4 competitive seats most seasons. If someone like Ocon was faster than Hamilton....we would have no way of knowing that. So yea, my bias it towards modern era drivers being better. I just don't rate Hamilton as good as Clark or Moss. In fact, I am not sure that the trio of Hamilton, Alonso and Vettel (who are all pretty damn good) are as good as the Prost-Senna pair that dominated F1 a while back. I am not convinced that Hamilton is quite the qualifier that Senna was, and is certainly not as complete a race driver as Prost was. Of course, they are not British, and the subject of the post is British drivers.

On the other hand, Clark and Moss were clearly the best drivers of their respective eras. Stirling Moss was clearly the fastest driver in F1 from 1958 to 1962, and in sports car racing, etc., and Clark kind of established himself as the dominant driver from 1962/63 - 1968.

 

[radical-one 0]

On October 24, 2017 at 0:07 AM, Sakae said:

23 October 2017   17:00 (CEST)

radical-one, as much as I agree with you (probably 4 years), yet it is half of the story. Significant and most trouble is a story of technical restrictiveness which destroyed everything WCC ever stood for. From premature homologation of new technology, right up to token system, which allowed two drivers to strive, and all of the others to struggle. How MB or their drivers can be proud of victories under those conditions we will never know, but apparently they are.   

Hamilton is too proud of himself up to the point that he thinks he's 90% reason why Merc is strong. He even commented that he will make Seb's life miserable.

Typical NARCISSIST. 

[Publius Cornelius Scipio 0]

13 hours ago, Ruslan said:

Well......I think you underrate Nigel Mansell. He did win over 30 GPs and with a little luck could have had 3 or 4 world championships. I think for several years, he was the most winning driver in F1. 

More often than not he had the best car 

Anyway, as you said I also think that Mansell got better with time, but that IMHO is further proof that he was not an exceptional talent like Clark, Senna or Hamilton but rather someone who had to work hard to improve his driving, like Rosberg (son). Furthermore Mansell had s ound technical knowldge and that certainly helped him in an era when race car technology was moving ahead at a very fast pace (active suspensions, etc)

[Ruslan 0]

On ‎10‎/‎25‎/‎2017 at 5:06 AM, Publius Cornelius Scipio said:

More often than not he had the best car 

Anyway, as you said I also think that Mansell got better with time, but that IMHO is further proof that he was not an exceptional talent like Clark, Senna or Hamilton but rather someone who had to work hard to improve his driving, like Rosberg (son). Furthermore Mansell had s ound technical knowldge and that certainly helped him in an era when race car technology was moving ahead at a very fast pace (active suspensions, etc)

No disagreement here. As much as I am fan of Mansell, he had to work to get where he was at and clearly was not the natural talent of a Clark, Senna or Hamilton (or De Angelis). The comparison to Rosberg (son) is apt.

What actually surprises me is that there are very few drivers who noticeably improve, relative to their peers, over time. Certainly Mansell, Rosberg (son), and Damon Hill improved over time. But most drivers seems to be about the same as they were in their tenth year in F1 as they were in their second year in F1.

[Publius Cornelius Scipio 0]

17 hours ago, Ruslan said:

No disagreement here. As much as I am fan of Mansell, he had to work to get where he was at and clearly was not the natural talent of a Clark, Senna or Hamilton (or De Angelis). The comparison to Rosberg (son) is apt.

What actually surprises me is that there are very few drivers who noticeably improve, relative to their peers, over time. Certainly Mansell, Rosberg (son), and Damon Hill improved over time. But most drivers seems to be about the same as they were in their tenth year in F1 as they were in their second year in F1.

I think that Jacques Villeneuve improved a lot after a few years in the junior formulae, in recent years I'd say that drivers who improved are Ericsson, Petrov, and a few others. To a certain extent I also think that Ricciardo improved a lot, he wasn't setting the world on fire in his early days, wasn't he? 

[Ruslan 0]

On ‎10‎/‎27‎/‎2017 at 4:39 AM, Publius Cornelius Scipio said:

I think that Jacques Villeneuve improved a lot after a few years in the junior formulae, in recent years I'd say that drivers who improved are Ericsson, Petrov, and a few others. To a certain extent I also think that Ricciardo improved a lot, he wasn't setting the world on fire in his early days, wasn't he? 

Well, I used to watch JV race in Indy Car....and he was impressive then. So......I think something happened between when you knew him and when I first saw him racing.

Love DR......I think he does amazing things, and his ability to somehow against all odds, come up with ways to beat drivers like Vettel and Verstappen is entertaining. I don't think he is one of the top drivers in the field, but he never ceases to surprise me.

[Sakae 0]

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