Can a driver be too good...?

[Moneyseeker]

Looking at the JJ Lehto thread made me think..

Can a driver be too good and too talented for their own good, which maybe means they don't have to apply themselves and thereby lack the discipline and end up as a flawed genius?

Not saying this neccesarily applies to JJ. But if you take Mansell as an example, he was never regarded as natural talent, but had the determination and drive to succeed, whereas say Jan Magnussen was regarded by JYS as the most talented driver to have been in his team, but achieved very little in F1.

Is it talent v potential v determination and application that actually makes the ideal driver?

[MGDavid]

is often the case, and across many sports; compare Gower with Boycott in cricket f'rinstance

[Peter Mallett]

I'd argue that it is really timing. Mansell is a good example. He was taken on board by Colin Chapman as a second string driver. Determined, but not expected to hit the top. His determination set him apart form others but I also suspect his ambition made him cheaper so he was slotted in at Williams where he partnered Keke Rosberg and that's when he started to shine.

The opposite may be said of Herbert. A great talent who was able to show Mika the way home in the dying Lotus team on many occasions, yet it was Mika who went on to be multiple WDC.

Another pairing is Senna and Brundle. Who knows what would have happened if Brundle had been picked up by one of the bigger teams instead of Tyrrel who were running two non turbo cars, rather than the single car of Toleman who picked up Senna.

I guess my point is that even if a great talent applies him/her self, there's no guarantee that those efforts will take them to the top.

[Paradise City]

Both Brundle and Herbert had damaging accidents. Herbert's was gruesome almost Kubica-esque. Herbert did very well to recover from that and be as competitive as he was. He would've been a British Schumacher had it not been for that accident.

[beau1]

The first two names that came to my mind are Jaques Villeneuve and Juan Pablo Montoya.

I realise both of them had their fair amount of success (more so Jaques) but both were outstanding in their first couple of seasons but were held back by either poor dicipline or poor choice of careers.

It is hard for me to think of a World Champion that had a fall from grace as bad as JV. I'm just looking at his F1 records now and it is hard to believe that he spent another 9 seasons in F1 after his championship year, yet failed to win another race and only managed to score 4 podiums.

[Greem]

JV chased the money. He may have been exceptionally well paid but the whole Pollock/BAR "we'll win the championship in year 1" was ludicrous and damaged his reputation.

Mind you we said that about Brawn. The difference was they stood quietly by with a knowing grin where BAR were the proverbial bull in the china shop.

[beau1]

Originally Posted by Greem

JV chased the money. He may have been exceptionally well paid but the whole Pollock/BAR "we'll win the championship in year 1" was ludicrous and damaged his reputation.

Mind you we said that about Brawn. The difference was they stood quietly by with a knowing grin where BAR were the proverbial bull in the china shop.

Yeah I agree.

Your point about Brawn is actually very relevant and it brings us full circle as far as the BAR/Honda debacle was concerned as I would have quite easily added Jenson Button to this list if the luck hadn't gone his way in 2009.
His career early movements were certainly questionable to say the least and he looked completely done for in 2008, even though he'd shown promise all the way through the Motorsport ranks and in 2004-2006

[chillibowl]

Originally Posted by Moneyseeker

Is it talent v potential v determination and application that actually makes the ideal driver?

great question!

in respect to Kimi Mclaren years, i used to often wonder which would have been more important. he clearly has the talent but would Kimi have won more and broken more records if he had more of MSchumi's blinding determination to win or if he had just had better timing and luck and found himself on a team with better reliability.

in the end i have to go with he ended up at Mclaren at the wrong time.

[phoenix]

I wrote some rubbish, so deleted it!

[bella]

i'm still thinking about this question. great thread.

motorsport 'success' is like a pie chart, isn't it. you want a driver who's smart, insanely gifted, and entirely committed in a perfect world. eventually, being smarter than the average but not quite as gifted would yield similar results, but only if they're totally and completely committed to the cause above and beyond the average too.

this all presupposes that the ultimate aim of any racing driver for his entire existence is to be an epic legendary driver in his relevant discipline. some drivers end up somewhere completely different to where they aimed to be but end up achieving far more as sportsmen and people than racing drivers. which is where it gets a bit existential and perhaps different to the direction everyone else is going in. in the end everyone's "tools" and life skills and strengths lend them to different levels and types of achievement.

i think there's another piece to the jigsaw far more important than timing. some drivers would be so much better if they just chilled out, unplugged the cable to the sports psychologists, binned off their trainers, dealt with their own problems and followed their instincts. you can't have someone else telling you how to learn from experiences and mistakes. you have to do it yourself.

[Moneyseeker]

Originally Posted by chillibowl

great question!

in respect to Kimi Mclaren years, i used to often wonder which would have been more important. he clearly has the talent but would Kimi have won more and broken more records if he had more of MSchumi's blinding determination to win or if he had just had better timing and luck and found himself on a team with better reliability.

I think a bit of both, MS drove Ferrari forward and made it a better team. Drivers who can make an average car look good are great IMO and although not a great fan, Alonso is an example of this.

But that is a different topic altogether.

[Peter Mallett]

James Hunt.

[Moneyseeker]

Originally Posted by bella

i'm still thinking about this question. great thread.

motorsport 'success' is like a pie chart, isn't it. you want a driver who's smart, insanely gifted, and entirely committed in a perfect world. eventually, being smarter than the average but not quite as gifted would yield similar results, but only if they're totally and completely committed to the cause above and beyond the average too.

this all presupposes that the ultimate aim of any racing driver for his entire existence is to be an epic legendary driver in his relevant discipline. some drivers end up somewhere completely different to where they aimed to be but end up achieving far more as sportsmen and people than racing drivers. which is where it gets a bit existential and perhaps different to the direction everyone else is going in. in the end everyone's "tools" and life skills and strengths lend them to different levels and types of achievement.

i think there's another piece to the jigsaw far more important than timing. some drivers would be so much better if they just chilled out, unplugged the cable to the sports psychologists, binned off their trainers, dealt with their own problems and followed their instincts. you can't have someone else telling you how to learn from experiences and mistakes. you have to do it yourself.

JYS commented recently that there is very little driver coaching in F1 which is not the case in many other high level sportsman. This is leaving a sort of semi mentor/coach role to their race engineers.

Presumably top F1 drivers don't think they need anyone to tell them how to drive, yet world record holders in the javelin (for example) all use coaches to both improve and maintain their level of performance.

In the case of F1 drivers, DNF's are quite often the result of poor decisions, which is a key aspect that continued driver coaching would help with.

[bella]

i'm thinking more of the state of mind aspect of sports psychology and whatnot, jackie stewart was (i believe) discussing more the decisionmaking on track. that's something i believe he has a point with, but on a strategy basis more than a core reaction decisionmaking basis, like, big picture awareness. but he probably picked the wrong one to be selling his services to with romain, someone ought to introduce him to maldonado

i'm picking my way through a sports psychology book (well, it's motorsport focussed) and frankly, it worries me that this sort of crap is what drivers are being taught to do with their minds. no wonder some of them end up in such a mess that they're unable to fulfil their potential. it's that side of things that seems to be significant in many young guys not being able to extract the most out of themselves to me.

of course, there's the headstrong guys like raikkonen who care only about going as quick as possible who will tread their own paths regardless which is just magnificent, but that's perhaps the kind of driver you address your original post to - the ones who leave you wondering.

like i say, i'm still thinking about it

[formerf1champ]

Originally Posted by Moneyseeker

Can a driver be too good?

No.

Not quite getting "Mansell wasn't a natural talent" thing. He may not have been fashionable to some people. But I don't know what aspect of driving/racing he was lacking in. Not having a go at you, just saying.

[nicanary]

This is a really interesting question - when I first saw it I started to think in terms of which drivers had under-achieved, but then realised that this is not what you're asking. I get Bella's point about sports psychologists, and wonder whether we'll ever see another driver who has the "James Hunt" philosophy.

The Gower/Boycott analogy is a good one, but the record books show that "Golden Boy" finished his career with excellent figures; I would say the sort of sportsman you're looking for would be Matt le Tissier, who really didn't care what happened and just enjoyed his football. His number of caps for England is a travesty.

The problem with motor-sport is the danger it once held (and still does to a certain degree). Thus many promising drivers never fulfilled expectations because they were cruelly taken from us, like Roger Williamson. If you want a blast from the past, think Tony Brooks. He had a sublime talent, and certainly applied himself, but only within his own self-agreed limitations. He simply would not take the risks of many of his peers, and even effectively lost the championship because he would not risk carrying-on after has car had been hit by another, and he didn't know what damage might have been caused. Personally, I don't begrudge him that - it's a certain sort of courage, like Niki Lauda's at Fuji. Being you "own man".

[chunterer]

Good thread and some of you are spot on this isn't to be confused with the what if's threads of which we have had many good ones ()

I can see both sides of the argument equally.

Some guys had such natural ability they blew the minds of their rivals who had a smudgeon of that talent yet relied on it too much and ignored the knuckling down aspects of pouring over data until the small hours and talking seriously with engineers rather than just paying lip service and being one of the lads.

The other thing is those natural genuises tend to come a bit unstuck when they eventually come across a car that needs to be properly sorted. Only some amount of driving round problems will work!

Nowadays a drive must have the following:

1/ Technical skills
2/ Complete mental strength
3/ Ability
4/ Consummate PR gabbling skills

[Peter Mallett]

Top of my head, the naturals that should have done better; Ronnie P; Keke R (WDC or not); Patrese; Amon; Seppi; et al.

[chunterer]

Originally Posted by Peter Mallett

Top of my head, the naturals that should have done better; Ronnie P; Keke R (WDC or not); Patrese; Amon; Seppi; et al.

Yes i'd go along with those, Patrese, arrived with suich promise but despite all those GP's never became a true top leveller. Something was missing, not speed or technical skills, his mind seemed alright (after all there was all that aggro he took after Ronnie death which he seemed to recover from).

Alesi had bundles of pure driving ability but maybe not the right approach in any other way!

The someone like Gilles who was super quick, quite technical and good with the media but simply didn't give a stuff about world titles just bothered about being the quickest and most daring out there. He was an enigma in that respect!

[wnut]

Originally Posted by Peter Mallett

Top of my head, the naturals that should have done better; Ronnie P; Keke R (WDC or not); Patrese; Amon; Seppi; et al.

Seppi never really had a top line car, and his death occurred right at the time he was reaching his peak. He was magnificent in sports cars, and I think he would have delivered in F1 if he'd had more time, and hopefully a top drive which he was certainly in line for. Porsche were sponsoring his F1 efforts with Rob Walker to prevent Ferrari getting hold of him with an offer of an F1 drive and using his talents in their sports cars.

[Born Racer]

Some drivers can drive some things better than others. Andretti's "if you can drive, you can drive" claim isn't universal. Perhaps Magnussen just struggled to adapt to Formula 1 and it wasn't all about the application and attitude. It's even odder when it's the other way round (someone like Kobayashi?).

Re: Kimi Raikkonen, he is not really an enigma. He is only considered as such because he does not fit the PR mould chunterer mentioned as a modern pre-requisite. I actually think he is getting everything out of himself he can and if anything his nonchalance and apparent immunity to pressure in most situations (Spa 2008, he fell off for instance) helps him extract the max out of himself. His supposed uniqueness only stems from the general traits most F1 drivers feel they have to display nowadays. He is his own character of course, but this should not be considered enigmatic.

[Tim 27]

Originally Posted by Born Racer

Some drivers can drive some things better than others. Andretti's "if you can drive, you can drive" claim isn't universal.

Couldn't agree more Born Racer, but by the same token someone is lightning quick in other formulas doesn't forget how to drive overnight (Magnussen at Stewart and Zanardi at Williams spring to mind).
The question of "Can a driver be too good" certainly narrows the choices down, those that had to work hard at it (Damon and Graham Hill for example) can be instantly excluded, leaving only the naturally talented racers to consider (Clark, Stewart, Senna, Prost, Villeneuve, Bellof, Alonso etc).

[werner]

Originally Posted by nicanary

The problem with motor-sport is the danger it once held (and still does to a certain degree). Thus many promising drivers never fulfilled expectations because they were cruelly taken from us, like Roger Williamson. If you want a blast from the past, think Tony Brooks. He had a sublime talent, and certainly applied himself, but only within his own self-agreed limitations. He simply would not take the risks of many of his peers, and even effectively lost the championship because he would not risk carrying-on after has car had been hit by another, and he didn't know what damage might have been caused. Personally, I don't begrudge him that - it's a certain sort of courage, like Niki Lauda's at Fuji. Being you "own man".

That's why I always get very annoyed when people in some other threads write that Formula 1 used to be better because it was more dangerous. It has costed us so many great athletes who either were hurt or killed or choose to not race or not race at the maximum of their abilities because of the risks involved.

[wnut]

Originally Posted by werner

That's why I always get very annoyed when people in some other threads write that Formula 1 used to be better because it was more dangerous. It has costed us so many great athletes who either were hurt or killed or choose to not race or not race at the maximum of their abilities because of the risks involved.

Yup, good post!

(Still don't like the fact that a driver in a quick car can make a whole bunch of mistakes, fall off a number of times and still win!) Gravel traps at least penalised the unworthy! Maybe you should get a drive through every time the four wheels outside the white line rule is crossed.

[Trev Campbell]

Originally Posted by chunterer

Good thread and some of you are spot on this isn't to be confused with the what if's threads of which we have had many good ones ()

I can see both sides of the argument equally.

Some guys had such natural ability they blew the minds of their rivals who had a smudgeon of that talent yet relied on it too much and ignored the knuckling down aspects of pouring over data until the small hours and talking seriously with engineers rather than just paying lip service and being one of the lads.

The other thing is those natural genuises tend to come a bit unstuck when they eventually come across a car that needs to be properly sorted. Only some amount of driving round problems will work!

Nowadays a drive must have the following:

1/ Technical skills
2/ Complete mental strength
3/ Ability
4/ Consummate PR gabbling skills

I think this can be seen clearly in the Red Bull Team. I think Vettel has more pure ability than Webber, Webber more mental strenght than Vettel. Tech Skills I couldn't tell you and PR about even but it totally different ways.

But with the first 2, the last 2 years I think has really shown the difference in the drivers. When the car is perfect ala 2011 Seb can use his natural ability to make the car do things that Webber simply can't match. This year however the car does not seem to be a world beater and is a little harder to drive. This is where Webber seems to have the edge on Vettel when the car isn't great he is able to force the car to perform more than the finesse Seb uses. But when Seb gets it right he will simply disappear into the distance like Bahrain and Valencia.