Do drivers get the F1 career they deserve?

[neil_davidson2]

Originally Posted by Draven

...even if a driver seemingly gets promoted to a top seat and doesnt produce it's not always a case of talent.

I was just thinking about the same thing Draven. Drivers that get to F1 have to have proven their ability to drive a car to a decent standard (even the ones that pay for their seats). So how much of a factor are the off-track politics and pressures that a driver has to face in F1 compared with the lower formulae?

[nobster]

I would live to have seen Mark Hynes and Robbie Kerr in F1
They have the talent but unfortunately not the cash needed these days.
What a waiste of talents this is

[BootsOntheSide]

I'd reacquaint yourself with van der Poele's record, marcus - in every car he drove he was impressive, more than matching Larini as a rookie at Lambo, beating Damon Hill convincingly at Brabham, and quickly adjusting to the Footwork and getting torwards Tarquini's pace when they too folded - all his teams ran out of money.

A lot of the guys who ended up succeeding in Sportscars, Touring Cars or Indycars have showed moments of form in F1 cars - Tarquini, Rahal, Schneider and Dalmas all come to mind, but none of those got a chance in even a midfield car. There are quite a few others who simply didn't get the right opportunity, perhaps due to a lack of testing or entering a team in difficult circumstances, or just looked fast in everything except F1 - guys like Zanardi, Jo Winkelhock, Rosset, Pantano and so on. Those are the hardest to realy rate.

[marcus]

yes true Boots , I guess what I was getting at was Vanderpoele's junior career results were very good indeed , he just didnt get the chance to show it in F1 , so to me that means I think he didnt get the F1 career he deserved.

and BTW Boots it was Fondmetal not Footwork

[RWC]

Now (the GPWC thing) would be a great time to completely rewrite the rules of f1 so that all disadvantages newcommers face are wiped out.
Forcing all drivers to drive for all teams is an awsome idea!! (and no it wasn't max's idea)

Have a pool of team-agreed drivers plus a ringer for each race (a local driver for that country,popular driver voted by public,etc)
It would completely cure several of the biggest flaws f1 has allways had!!!

No more blatant team orders
Drivers would be racing PURELY for the WDC
Teams would be racing PURELY for the WCC
NO team would be able to buy better drivers!

[M Coupe]

Originally Posted by Kicking-back

Jorg has done a lot of tyre testing, and I think he would have been a solid F1 man, yes, but I don't regard him as a great lost talent.

Jorg did all the initial engine testing for BMW, I was lucky enough to see his first test .


For me the biggest waste of talent in the last 15 years was McNish, the poor season with DAMS in F3000 knocked his confidence and unfortunatly the F1 teams couldn't see past the results to look at the dog of a car the Lola was that year. His accident at Donington was a knock again but he proved in Sportscars he had got over all that, and as for Toyota .

[N I Tram]

To be honest, you could put together a whole grid of drivers from the last 15 years who either never got a chance in F1 or never took a top result (in most cases through no fault of their own) and it'd be comparable in talent to the current grid (other than the top 4 or 5 current drivers). Most of the guys that'd include have been mentioned - McNish, van der Poele, Schneider, Zanardi, Hynes, Kerr, Kristiansen, Magnussen etc.

[Kicking-back]

But if you included all the guys who "should have had a chance", you'd then have a lot of people shoved out and then they'd be the guys who "should have had a chance".

[ensign14]

Not if those shoved out are Giovanni Lavaggi, Jean-Denis Deletraz, Gregor Foitek (the most dangerous driver I have seen and one who should have been banned sine die long before he got to F1), Pedro Diniz, Toshio Suzuki, Francois Hesnault, Michael Bartels, Philippe Adams, Ricardo Zunino, Vincenzo Sospiri (yes I know he was F3000 champ, but good grief he took about 5 years to win a race there), Enrico Bertaggia, Franco Forini, Adrian Campos and Claudio Langes...someone like Lees or Muller would have destroyed that lot.

[BSchneiderFan]

Diniz wasn't as bad as some people made out, and he improved a lot towards the end of his stint in F1.

[Kicking-back]

Oh, I agree with that, yes, but the teams who employed them (or more pointedly the teams who were employed by them) may have gone bust otherwise.

[ensign14]

Hmm...looking at the list, I think the only team that employed any of the above drivers that has NOT gone bust is Minardi - Coloni is still around but not as a constructor.

Diniz never won a race in his entire career, that's why I included him; even someone like Ellen Lohr had a better claim to F1 on that basis.

[Gabrio]

I'm no fan of Diniz, but it has to be said that the guy has matched Alesi and Hill on his day...

[agwiii]

Originally Posted by RWC

Forcing all drivers to drive for all teams is an awsome idea!! (and no it wasn't max's idea) Have a pool of team-agreed drivers plus a ringer for each race (a local driver for that country,popular driver voted by public,etc) It would completely cure several of the biggest flaws f1 has allways had!!!

This would also require special race track configuration.

[agwiii]

Originally Posted by Skam85

back on topic, some drivers have ... wasted their opportunity (complacency, laziness).

WASTED-
Magnussen, Bruni, Pizzonia, da Matta, C Fittipaldi, Michael Andretti, Vertsappen, Burti, de la Rosa, Zanardi

In particular Andretti simply threw away his opportunity. Was it bad luck to be teamed with Senna, or was that another missed opportunity to learn from the dominant driver of the time? In any even, his performance was underwhelming and often embarassing.

[agwiii]

While on the subject of underwhelming drivers, is there anyone who could top Alex Young?

[Kicking-back]

Yoong was competent compared with Mr Deletraz.

[ensign14]

I never got Deletraz. The guy had a couple of podia in F3000 so he could not have been clueless, yet he was so slow that he stalled on a straight or something. Was he just totally spooked or something?

Whether Diniz matched Hill or Alesi is not the point - his record in lower formulae did not suggest that on merit he should have had 3-4 years in F1. On that basis he did not deserve an F1 career. Neither did Niki Lauda on the basis of his record, though. It goes back to my earlier point to a degree though that some drivers get better as they climb the formulae (Lauda, Hunt) and Diniz did himself no favours by getting there ASAP; IMO he would have been better off having another season in F3000 and getting more skills down - and winning races.

But if Diniz had given up after his F3000 season I doubt that anyone would have considered him a driver that deserved an F1 chance - at least any more than, say, Jean-Pierre Jaussaud or Maurizio Flammini.

[agwiii]

Some drivers also have off track skills that help them get, and keep their drives.

[agwiii]

Originally Posted by ensign14

I never got Deletraz. The guy had a couple of podia in F3000 so he could not have been clueless, yet he was so slow that he stalled on a straight or something. Was he just totally spooked or something?

Whether Diniz matched Hill or Alesi is not the point - his record in lower formulae did not suggest that on merit he should have had 3-4 years in F1. On that basis he did not deserve an F1 career. Neither did Niki Lauda on the basis of his record, though. It goes back to my earlier point to a degree though that some drivers get better as they climb the formulae (Lauda, Hunt) and Diniz did himself no favours by getting there ASAP; IMO he would have been better off having another season in F3000 and getting more skills down - and winning races.

But if Diniz had given up after his F3000 season I doubt that anyone would have considered him a driver that deserved an F1 chance - at least any more than, say, Jean-Pierre Jaussaud or Maurizio Flammini.

Predicting the future from the past has always been difficult. If experience and success were the only factor, Raikkonen would not be at Mercedes Benz.

[Armco Bender]

Maurizio Flammini

IIRC it was the fact he destroyed most of March's F2 cars then started of the F1 cars in testing,so he was shown the door and the toe of a boot.

[Andrew Hornsey]

I cant believe that Frentzen has not been mentioned. When he was with Mercedes, he was as quick, if not quicker than Schumacher. Yet when he got to F1, he was totally eclipsed by his former team mate.

Yes he drove for Williams, but at a time when the car wasn't the best out there.

[agwiii]

Originally Posted by Andrew Hornsey

I cant believe that Frentzen has not been mentioned. When he was with Mercedes, he was as quick, if not quicker than Schumacher. Yet when he got to F1, he was totally eclipsed by his former team mate.

Yes he drove for Williams, but at a time when the car wasn't the best out there.

Andrew, there was a time when HHF was considered very fast. You are correct to point out that Schumacher very quickly eclipsed him -- both on the track and off. Success has to do with things the drivers do off the track, as well as on.

[BootsOntheSide]

Originally Posted by ensign14

Not if those shoved out are Giovanni Lavaggi, Jean-Denis Deletraz, Gregor Foitek (the most dangerous driver I have seen and one who should have been banned sine die long before he got to F1), Pedro Diniz, Toshio Suzuki, Francois Hesnault, Michael Bartels, Philippe Adams, Ricardo Zunino, Vincenzo Sospiri (yes I know he was F3000 champ, but good grief he took about 5 years to win a race there), Enrico Bertaggia, Franco Forini, Adrian Campos and Claudio Langes...someone like Lees or Muller would have destroyed that lot.

Diniz doesn't belong in that list, and I'm not sure Hesnault does, while Toshio just paid for 2 races as a way to put the icing on his career before he retired - he wasn't really a problem to anyone. But you're definitely right that there are a lot of drivers who never got into F1 who have a lot more talent than any of those - and not all of them brought money.

[Ryo28]

You could argue that drivers like Pedro Chaves, Vincenzo Sospiri, Gary Brabham and Perry McCarthy didn't get the F1 careers they deserved, as they all made it to Formula 1 but never had a chance to even get a proper shot at qualifying for a race due to their godawful equipment.

Also, how about Bertrand Gachot, he showed extremely well for Jordan in 1991, and got the fastest lap in Hungary, but was then jailed for an incident involving CS gas, and never subsequently got a competitive drive. I'd also mention Eric Bernard, Nicola Larini, Eric Van der Poele and Ivan Capelli, who all showed well at some point in F1, but either weren't given enough opportunities or (in the case of Capelli especially) squandered their chances.