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Old 29 Jul 2005, 22:46 (Ref:1366958)   #37
John Turner
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Originally Posted by deeks6
GP racing, like no other sport invokes a lot of emotion and passion. Fans have their favorites and nothing will sway them from opinions that they were "better" than the next guy. The point is, though, to make a case for them, you must have set criteria as to what makes the "best". Surely, the WDC is that criteria. To win it, you must be CONSISTENTLY fast, reliable, good at qualifying and development, work well with the team, win races etc etc.

Some of the ones that invoke the most discussion:

Moss - already discussed

GV - if you said he was the most entertaining driver ever, I'd probably not argue but best? Not even close...clearly beaten by Reutemann and Sheckter, Reutemann clearly beaten by Jones and not many would say Jones was the best ever.

Ronnie Peterson - could'nt get close to Mario...

Amon - never won a GP. Come on...

Alesi - please...

JV - much maligned, no doubt because of his last 6 or 7 years but he was a mighty good racer. Challenged for WDC in 1st year against a good teammate and then won it. He may have lost the plot now but I recall some fantastic drives in 96-97 with some daring moves to boot.

Dan Gurney - yes, probably the unluckiest driver of all time - should have won 3 WDC's if not for poor judgement moving camps. None other than Jack Brabham rated him one of the best ever and was desperate for Dan to head up his 66 challenge, which history shows would have been a walk in the park for the big fella. I rate him the best non-WDC. Check his overall record in ALL forms of motorsport. Impressive.

The much maligned (underrated drivers):

Jack Brabham - despite his incredible record, most "British" fans don't rate him (e.g. Murray Walker did'nt have him in the top 10). Crikey, 3 WDC's (2 of them against Moss) and one in a car he designed and built and he does'nt rate in the Top 10? Wow. If you want proof of his ability, check 1966 - despite the fact he was not going to drive (Dan Gurney was hid No 1 driver until leaving), he beat 7 past or future world champs (Clark, P Hill, G Hill, Stewart, Rindt, Surtees and Hulme), 10 other GP winners (Bandini, Bonnier, Ginther, Ireland, Scarfiotti, Baghetti, Gurney 7, McLaren 4, Rodriguez 2, Siffert 2) as well as other highly rated drivers Amon, Parkes and Spence. Not Top 10? You must be joking!

Mario Andretti - won everything except the Tour de France. A superstar...and one of the best set-up men of all time.

Phil Hill - WDC, 6 GP wins in 49 starts, Le Mans ... a lot of guys would love to be that bad.

Mike Hawthorn - beat Moss in 1958 despite having an inferior car (Moss teammate won 3 GP's that year also) and just to put a lie to the Moss speed factor, Hawthorn had 5 FL's to Moss 3.

If it was'nt F1, this would not be an argument at all. In any other sport, the greatest are the World Champs.
Would we remember Mohammed Ali if he'd just won an Olympic medal? No.
Ron Clarke set more distance running records than any athlete in history but does anyone rate him with Zatopek, Nurmi, Viren etc? No, because he failed at the highest level.

"Best" or "Better" means you achieved more at the HIGHEST level, surely ...

I can't resist responding to this as well! Do you really think that F1 engenders more emotion and passion than other sports? In Britain, at least Football (soccer) generates more, and, in America, I guess, baseball does!

I agree that the WDC is one criteria to judge a driver by, but not the sole one! Almost every facet of life in the world has its injustices, not all intentional, so why should motor racing be any different? We have already cited 1958, and there have been one or two other less obvious examples. However, I will come forward to 2003 to use as an example how such an injustice could have occurred again. We regularly hear how Kimi Raikkonen nearly won the WDC that year which is true, and he only lost it by 2 (?) points. In reality, he was miles away since he won just one GP to Schumachers 6. Had a couple of placings during the season been reversed, we would have had a result artificially created by the points scoring system completely divorced from reality. So you have to use other criteria, based on competitiveness of the machinery being used, performance of the driver during the races, even when he didn't finish (an example was the last GP - Kimi retired in the lead after less than half the race was completed, yet many have made him driver of the race) and others which are almost intangible.

Now, what about those you have mentioned in your above post;

Moss - as you say, already discussed and we are miles apart!

Gilles Villeneuve - regarded by many (but not by me, incidentally) as the greatest driver ever, and certainly one of the fastest. A man who would drag his car round on his back if he could. But why do you exaggerate so much? How can you say that he was 'not even close to' and 'clearly beaten' by Scheckter when in 1979 they won 3 races apiece and finished 4 points apart? And since you think, from your reference to Hawthorn, that fastest laps are important, Gilles also posted 7 fastest laps in 1979. In 1980 he finished ahead of Scheckter, in the same car. Now, tell me Scheckter was better! Yes, he was clearly beaten by Reutemann in 1978 but that was Gilles first full F1 season.

Ronnie Peterson. Regarded by many as the fastest driver of his generation (he died before GV really got going and was one of GV's heroes), he played No 2 to Mario, since that was what he was contracted to do, and won 2 races to Andrettis 6. But actually he did get close, and on 4 occasions, he finished a very close second to Mario. He also finished second to him in the WDC by only 13 points despite his tragic death with 3 races still to go. So, actually, a close call.

Chris Amon - Just find out about him. Very highly regarded by his contemporaries, particularly Jackie Stewart, he just has to be the unluckiest F1 driver of all time in terms of results, was usually in the wrong team, but occasionally lost races when leading through mechanical failure. Probably not better than any WDC winners but a whole lot better than his results show.

Jean Alesi - Tend to agree with you. Passionate and aggressive, he did not have the patience or the rationality to be a consistent winner. deserved more than one GP win though.

JV - a WDC, and deservedly so in his winning year, so I agree

Dan Gurney - a great driver highly regarded by both Clark and Brabham and capable of winning a WDC, he was probably better than some WDCs. But the argument you have used in his favour is in effect the same one you have used against Moss. He won far less Gps than Moss, and if you think Gurney's record outside F1 is impressive, check out Stirling's.

Jack Brabham - As I have said in my earlier post, I agree that he is underrated, but again there were some contemporaries who were as good if not better.

Mario Andretti; great driver but his edge over Ronnie (see above) was marginal.

Phil Hill; deserved winner of WDC, but certainly not the best of his generation

Mike Hawthorn; great and fast driver, but actually the Ferrari was an easier car to drive than the Vanwall which was only quicker because of the calibre of its drivers. The reference to 5 to 3 in favour of Hawthorn over Moss in fastest laps is pretty meaningless as a statistic when I point out that race wins was 4 to 1 in Stirling's favour - and one of those wins was in a 2 litre Cooper.

Finally, I have to say that you can achieve much at the highest level of F1 without winning the WDC.
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