Best Test/Development Driver Of the Last Decade

[santori]

Between Damon, Michael and Heinz. As everyone has said about the first two but remember also what Heinz did on such small budgets. I'm sure the '99 Jordan was helped greatly by having 2 of the above 3 involved.

[Spudgun]

Damon got my vote.

I have to echo previous thoughts on this thread. Damon was great with testing feedback. Nigel Mansell won the WDC with the most dominant car (although I think he could have done it with less of an avantage. 1986/7 were just unlucky. After all he was still the no 2 back then which I find even more impressive. Sorry OT) and Damon was a major contributor to the dominance of that car.

[Mattracer]

Damon was pretty much behing all of Williams' dominance in the early to mid-nineties.

TGF is an excellent tester too but the cast of "thousands" behind the scenes on the test team do a lot of the work befoe he goes near it I would surmise. Doesn't Ferrari have about three testers or something and they've got Fiorano for themeselves and Mugello booked out until half-past forever.

[GTRMagic]

Ayrton Senna da Silva. Taking a McLaren with an unloved customer Cosworth and banging people's heads with it all season in 1993. Could drive around problems but wasnt averse to trying teammates' settings (even if he didnt like sharing his own)

[deeks6]

Originally posted by BootsOntheSide

but I probably should've included Gené instead.

Agree with this...I'd put him high on the list.

First 2 must be Hill and Schuey...Schuey for the INTITAL development at Ferrari and his ongoing feedback, Damon because every car he has been associated with has gone faster after. I'd like to have been able to vote for a dead-heat.

I think Webber has done (is doing) a fine job lately and Gene is a vastly underrated driver who is doing a super job assisting Williams.

[BootsOntheSide]

Development skill is definatley one of Webber's finest attributes, especially as he's still fairly inexperienced. he could become the consumate contender in theis category, but my choice was Damon, who was often a better tester than racer (as 95 and 99 showed, those cars seemed to improve as the season went on even thoguh it was the team-mates who reaped the rewards)

[Super Tourer]

Schumacher - not only for direct development of the car, but generally getting the best out of all aspects of the team, working harder with the engineers, and galvanising the effort.

I see Montoya as more in the Rosberg mould. As an interesting parallel, Keke moved to McLaren from William's and never really gelled with the car, bearing in mind McLaren were used to the Prost/Lauda approach in developing and driving ,their cars, not the spectacular 'banzai' Rosberg approach.

I'm not saying history will repeat itself, but it's interesting none the less.

[Smokey 6 litre]

i dont like the bloke, but what TGF has achived with Ferrari
is amasing...although they've had the determination and finance that they didn't before he arrived.

[ASCII Man]

Originally posted by Smokey 6 litre
although they've had the determination and finance that they didn't before he arrived.

Isn't this contradicting?

[Jordi]

Damon. Hey, if he wasn't regarded as a natural talent, he must have been one hell of a development driver to get where he got!

Probably the only car that Damon didn't make faster was the Brabham BT60B, but that was a hopeless case...

[krt917]

I can see the argument that we can't really know, but I think that the fact that Newey wanted Hill to stay at Williams, and left within a year of Damon going, says a lot for Hill. I'm sure Williams' subsequent decline was due to Hill's leaving as well as Newey going.

I've given the nod over Schuey because I see Michael's strength as slightly different. He has been able to build up the team and get the right people around him so that the cars got better. I'm sure that he's a pretty good tester too, but I give Hill the nod.

I am slightly surprised that DC hasn't got any votes as, although his race perfromances (or should that be qualifying performances?) have been a bit off on occassion, I get the impression that he gives a lot of input, especially at the moment since Kimi is still inexperienced in that respect.

[avsfan733]

I think it has to go to Luca...he has had maybe as large a hand in developing the car as Michael has...sure Michael brought the designers, but Luca was really the guy who proved the concepts everyday at Fiorano.

If he hadn't had been there I probably would have been voting for the other and putting in Zanardi I have heard incredible things about his feel for the car and such stories as him noticing a camber problem while driving by watching the tire change colour while he cornered

[Gt_R]

Being an admirer of Michael's ability, i would definitely put him up as one of the best developement driver. Usually, Michael would get the first taste of the new car and pin point any potential weaknesses of the car.

I've read up a lot of the things his engineers talk about, and many respect his ability to reproduce laps and laps of data (ie where the car is weak/wrong/right) like a computer. And whenever Ferrari have major updates for the car, they sought Michael's highly regarded opinion.

Eddie once said that when Michael was out in '99, the team just stood still in developements. Partly was the fact that the team lost motivation, but partly was Michael's amazing influence in car developement. Eddie did stress that with other drivers, engineers couldn't be sure if any poor feedback from new parts is down to car or driver, but if Michael failed to set times with a new part, it's the failure of the part, not driver. And lastly, Ferrari made great steps in developements since 1996, and as much as the team's effort, Michael's contributions is significant.

And i'd take this opportunity to also praise Luca Badoer as a tremendous tester. He had been working with Ferrari for so long (which in itself speaks volume) and is trusted by Ferrari/Michael/Rubens. He's known to provide consistent, reliable and useful feedback, and thanks to him to do much of the donkey work that led to the amazing achievements in recent years.

And from what i've heard, Hill's a very handy tester (which is the reason why he is promoted to race driver) and i believe it to be the case. Panis too.

[deeks6]

Originally posted by Jordi
Damon. Hey, if he wasn't regarded as a natural talent, he must have been one hell of a development driver to get where he got!

Probably the only car that Damon didn't make faster was the Brabham BT60B, but that was a hopeless case...

Damon was a very much underrated driver. The English darling always seems to be Mansell, but Damon fared much better as a teammate to Prost and the great man himself held Hill in very high regard. He also competed well against Senna as a teammate and beat all the other teammates he had.

I was never sure what to make of him until after he left Williams and showed what he could do in bad cars. Hi performance at Hungary in the Arrows is a standout achievement and his efforts at Jordan were particularly good as well...

Did he have an engineering backround (I'm not sure) but maybe this helped his development work, which is rightly praised.

[Mattracer]

Originally posted by GTRMagic
Ayrton Senna da Silva. Taking a McLaren with an unloved customer Cosworth and banging people's heads with it all season in 1993. Could drive around problems but wasnt averse to trying teammates' settings (even if he didnt like sharing his own)

Isn't there a difference though between developing and driving around fundamental technical deficiencies based on intuitive feel and sheer willpower?

[krt917]

Originally posted by deeks6
Damon was a very much underrated driver. The English darling always seems to be Mansell, but Damon fared much better as a teammate to Prost and the great man himself held Hill in very high regard. He also competed well against Senna as a teammate and beat all the other teammates he had.

I agree that Damon has been much underrated, though I think the comparison with Mansell over Prost is a little unfair. Prost was almost certainly past his peak in 1993 and had Mansell been at Williams that season (with Prost) I suspect he would have retained his title. Afterall, Williams have usually been able to run two competitive cars, which is more than can be said of the 1990 Ferrari team......


As has previously been suggested, Mansell and Prost would both be candidates for 'best test driver', but they're just a little early for 'the last decade'.

[krt917]

Originally posted by Mattracer
Isn't there a difference though between developing and driving around fundamental technical deficiencies based on intuitive feel and sheer willpower?

I must admit that this thought occurred to me, though it is probably fair to say that McLaren made strides towards Williams in the last part of the season.

[Mattracer]

Is that before or after Hakkinen's arrival?

And Senna's lobbying for the same spec Ford engine as Schumacher's Bennetton?

[garcon]

Seems most agree it's between Damon and Michael.

It's very close, but I voted Michael because I believe he has had an enormous influence on the development of the Ferrari over recent years. Of course having "his" team of Brawn and co. around him has helped, but few other drivers have ever had the level of understanding Michael has of how the car works and what can make it better.

Having said that, the most important job of a test/development driver is to be able to explain to the engineers exactly how the car is behaving, and precisely what effect set up changes have had. this gives the engineers the information they need to decide how to change the car. A driver's ability to contribute to that process is, I think, secondary.

This is one of the reasons Damon was so good. He arguably had less natural talent than some, so had to "learn" the skill. That learning process gave him a proper insight into how the car behaves.