The wrong champion?

[Ed-f1]

There are many reasons while people have failed to win world championships. Sometimes drivers have been killed (Von Trips 61, Clark 68, Villeneuve 82, Senna 94) or injured (Lauda 76, Mansell 87, Schumacher 99) in what might otherwise have been championship winning years. There are many stories of championships being lost in the final round through no fault of the driver - Collins giving up his chance of the championship in 56 by handing his car to team leader Fangio, G Hill losing the 64 championship by 1 point after being hit by the Ferrari of Bandini at the start, Clark losing the championship on the final lap of that same race with an engine blow-out and Mansell's puncture in 86. Using the current points system would alter the outcome of a few championships as well (Moss 58, Prost 84 & 88). Of course countless drivers have been let down by under powered or unreliable cars throughout the history of the world championship as well. My question is - throughout the history of the World championship which years do you think one of the runners up have deserved the championship more than that years eventual winner?

[downforce]

97+98....Schuey, if the car had anything left there wouldnt have been a "shove-jacques" maneouvre.
...if the clutch had stayed and the puncture didnt happen.....Schuey again.

But then if = f1 backwards...no?

[fastracer]

I think last year Irvine deserved to be champion because Mika screwed up way to many times to be the world champion and caught a huge break when TGF went out and when Irvine's pit crew couldn't find the fourth tire.

[Valve Bounce]

Other racers can also give tons of excuses. In my last class championship, I survived the loss of my spinnaker halyard, did bare head sail changes, and we still won the race handsomely, and went on to win the championship. I do feel sorry for competitors when things go wrong - we drink beer at the main bar after each regatta. I suppose in motor racing, the same applies. Nobody wants to listen to excuses. The only one I really feel sad for is Rindt, because he nearly won the championship, and more so because of his fatal accident.
I am sure that someone here could say that Marc Gene deserves to be WDC this year, if only he could land a ride in the McLaren.

[EERO]

Damon Hill SHOULD have been WDC in 1994, but a certain fellow saw fit to crash his terminally damaged car into him.

Given all that Hill had to deal with that season, Senna's death; being thrust into a leadership role as an inexperienced F1 drive; geting into a difficult car that had cost the world's best driver his life; little support from Williams who kept looking for ways to get Nige back; TGF having accumulated a sizeable lead in the WDC-I think he showed that he was made of stern stuff and he deserved a fair fight at least in Adelaide.

[Ralf's Girl]

I agree. During the 1994 season, Schumacher made some very low-grade, cheap-shot comments about Hill not really being a number one driver. Unfortunately for poor little TGF (), Damon didn't rise to his bait, which not only proved him to be a more worthy champion as a person, but proved just how small-minded our dear friend TGF is.

[R]

Ohhh, where do you start...

First of all, I think that whoever wins a WDC deserves it. But there has been years when you think that another driver could just as easily or rather have won it.

1976 springs to mind. It was before my time, but I've seen the pictures. Niki Lauda would have won that championship had he not had that horrific crash at the Nürburgring. In the end he lost out to James Hunt by one single point after having sat out two races. I'm not saying Hunt didn't deserve the WDC. I'm saying Lauda was by far the most likely to win it if he had not had that accident.

1982 is another year that springs to mind. Again before my time. It was of course the year when Gilles Villeneuve was killed, and his Ferrari team-mate Didier Pironi had a career-ending crash in practice for the German GP. In the end Keke Rosberg won the WDC after having scored just one win. I think Villeneuve would have taken the WDC had he not been killed. And I think Pironi would have taken it had he not been injured (Pironi was injured 5 races from the end of the season, and he was just 5 points behind Rosberg in the final standings - he would have taken the championship).

That's really the only two seasons where I'm pretty certain we would have had another WDC bar injuries and death. 1961 (von Trips), 1968 (Clark), 1994 (Senna) - maybe, maybe not. Yes, they were the best drivers, but would they have won that year - I'm not sure. Mansell 87 and TGF last year - no I don't think so.

Regarding TGF in 94 - or M.Schumacher as we knew him back then - yes I agree he made some stupid comments, but in the end he deserved the WDC, he was disqualified from the British (2nd) and Belgian (1st) GPs, had a two race ban after that, but still scored enough points to win.

Jochen Rindt, BTW, DID win the 1970 WDC, albeit posthumously.

And Eddie Irvine never deserved to be champion.

[Mr.S]

Eddie why? Mika messed up a lot more then Eddie, sure I didn't like the whole Malaysian GP thing but, I would mainly like to hear any reasons why he shouldn't.

Imagine though Eddie manages what Shuey didn't that I would have loved to see the look on Michaels face!!!

[RussianFriend]

The success TFG got at Adelaida he returned at Herez. Michaelle was wrong champion in 1994, but Villneuve was the same in 1997. At least an half of his wins of 1997 was regarding other's taking off or breaking down.

[yorkie]

Returning to the original question, 1986 springs to mind. Mansell was unlucky on two counts, the first is the blowout but the second was that he managed to wrestle the car into the ecape lane. If he jhad stopped the car on the main straight the race would have been stopped (no sill saftey cars then) and as a result he would have been awarded third place and the WC.

In 1987 I don't think that Mansell would have won the WC because Piquet was throwing the teddy bear all over the place and he was the darling on Honda (Piquet move to Lotus for '88 with Honda).

I think that the outcome of '94 was correct although for the move on Hill it would have been TGF's just dessert to lose the championship.

I agree with R about 1982.

[R]

Originally posted by Mr.S
Eddie why? Mika messed up a lot more then Eddie, sure I didn't like the whole Malaysian GP thing but, I would mainly like to hear any reasons why he shouldn't.

OK, I'll give you my most important reason. Eddie was no.2 driver to TGF last year. I'll never forget in 1996 when Damon Hill became WDC, and Eddie said it was completely uninteresting who won, because Damon had inherited the seat. There and then I took an utter disliking to Eddie. When he can say that about others, the same in my view applies to someone with that kind of attitude when he ends up in the same situation. That's my most important reason for not thinking he deserved the championship, and thank goodness he didn't get it.

Other reason is of course that Mika Salo showed just what a below average driver (by F1 standards) Eddie Irvine is when he substituted TGF. He would for instance have won in Germany were it not for team orders, and beat him well in the Italian GP.

Imagine though Eddie manages what Shuey didn't that I would have loved to see the look on Michaels face!!!

Now THAT would have been cool, I have to agree, to have seen the look on TGF's face!

[Mr.S]

Ok, makes sense I didn't know about that little incident with Hill. Although I think that Ferrari might have had something to do with that statement he still shouldn't have said it.

A question, if Eddie was champion would Ferrari get the number one or would Jaguar, if you will notice the number three is awarded to the runner up in the championship but that number is on Schumacher's car.

[angst]

Jaguar would get the number 1, as when Damon joined Arrows, he took the number one with him.

[R]

Angst, you took the words right out of my mouth. And when last year's champion is no longer in F1, there is no car with number 1, like we saw in 93 after Mansell went to Indycars and in 94 after Prost retired. Both these seasons Damon had number zero on his car.

[angst]

Ronnie Peterson had the number 1 on his car after Jackie Stewart retired, as the first driver of the constructors cup.

[Don K]

As far as I remember, Senna had number 1 in 1994.
After his death, the team had numbers 0 and 2 for the rest of the season.

[R]

No, I must correct that. Senna had car number 2 in 94. Damon had car number 0 all season.

Thanks for the info on Ronnie Peterson BTW, Angst, I didn't know that.

[Ed-f1]

If Eddie Irvine had had one more point going into the final round lst year he would have been champion (assuming TGF followed team-orders). I can think of 3 occasions when he could and perhaps should have scored more points last season.
1 The French GP - Eddie was 6th, Michael 5th and Eddie clearly had the faster car. I thought at the time Eddie could have finished 4th or 3rd if Ferrari lat him past Michael earning more Constructors Championship points. However, because of team orders he was only allowed to finish 6th. I wonder if Ferrari regret that decision

2 The Nurburgring and THAT pit-stop

3 The Hungarian GP - Irvine was 2nd and being pressured by DC when he span off and lost the position.

It's because of number 3 that I think perhaps justice was done by him not winning the championship. If he was a true champion he wouldn't have spun off under pressure and so he can blame himself really that he failed to win the championship.

Before anyone says anything, yes I know Hakkinen made mistakes last season as well but he was probably also let down by team failures more than Irvine was.

[Valve Bounce]

Well, I always believed that Italians could count to 4 without taking their shoes off!! I felt sorry for Eddie that day.

[fastracer]

Didn't Irvine suffer a differential problem and had a bad set of tires during the Hungarian GP? (I am pretty sure of it) So that shows that he didn't spin off JUST because of pressure by Coulthard.

[Liz]

But there was no conspiracy against Eddie, right? He was just not any good.

As to the championship that should have been but was not - 1979 should have belonged to Gilles. Had he been a "modern day" pilot who ignored team orders and played politics with the team, it would have been his.

And of course since I am always for Prost, the one where Lauda beat him by 1/2 point - I always thought Prost deserved that one, and it is the only time I ever saw him cry on the podium because he lost it. Had he won that championship, he would have equalled Fangio and set the bar so high that no one would ever reach it again.

[Mr.S]

But why does Shuey have the number three, I think because he is the lead driver... but I dont know.

[Tristan]

The rest of the numbers are in order of how the CONSTRUCTORS finished. In the "better" teams, the odd number is team leader. However there is no no.13, so after that the even numbered car has team leadership. BAR have no.s 21/22 because they came bottom last year, were inexcusably awful (with that HUMUNGEOUS budget!!!) and are BIG MONEY LOOSERS!!!!! See?

[R]

Yes, and this is of course also how the pits are ordered in the pit-lane, except here the constructor's list from last year counts, regardless of who won the WDC. Which is why Ferrari has the first pit and BAR the last.

[R]

Oh, just thought of something. Villeneuve has no. 22 on his car, so I suppose Zonta must have no. 23 to add up the numbers.