Nordschleife

Arguably, F1 drivers have to achieve a greater level of fitness than CHAMP car drivers. AS to the reasons for this, you may draw your own conclusions.

Very few F1 drivers are contractually restrained from taking part in other events, however their principals don't particularly like it and so, being the good little bunnies they are, they toe the corporate line.
rankly, having seen F1 guys getting off their faces during the 24 Hours at Le Mans, I would have thought they would have been safer driving a race cars. At their levels of fitness, alcohol goes straight to their heads!

R+C

Bill935K3

I don't think the above is as big a deal as it is being made. As we are comparing best laps over several days and they did mega laps (like 70 to 80 per day?) During the course of the tests everyone had to be light on good tires at some time.
IMHO put SB in Renault or Ferrari and he will be on podium in three races. Is he as good as MS – KR – FA ? only way to tell is if he gets a ride in one of the best cars.
It would be nice to see him get a real chance as I think US fans really like to see Home Grown racers move into F1

A.Wayne

Look , saying that he out qualified senna , means nothing , gerhard berger did it on many occassions and is actually a better driver than mika, he had the disadvantage of being in the sport at the wrong time , if he had been in mika's time he would have been a WC.

But now that you have brought this up you shold go on to say , how senna had passed mika on the first lap and how mika went on to crash and destroy the car during the race ( ANOTHER ONE ) or in japan, in the rain senna destroyed mika , or the race after that in Australia where mika was almost a lap down at the end to Senna SO COME ON! COMPARING THE 2 IS CHEESE TO CHALK, YOU SHOULD NOT MENTION SENNA AND MIKA IN THE SAME SENTENCE OK!

A.Wayne

Finn,
Mika is a 2 time WC, a fact.
i like Mika , but you have to stop this CNN type defacto program

Mika at lotus was not faster than herbert and the only reason he got the mcclaren drive was that lotus would not release herbert to Ron dennis - FACT!

Mika has never beaten or even come close to beating SENNA ! PLeeeeeese !
Mika did beat David Coulthard , but Coulthard was a multi winner for Mcclaren long before Mika won his first Race., Mika then went on to show his heels to Coulthard.` YES MIKA IS/WAS SLOWER THAN NIGEL MANSEL ! MIKA WAS not as fast as keke Rosberg , who was slower than mansel OK!

Mika is /was not better than MS, but i do believe he was a better racer , jut not as complete a package as MS.

Since senna MS has been hands down the best F1 driver and is the most successful by far - FACT ,
I still stand behind my original statement that mika 's career happened because Ron Dennis was patient enough , under normal circumstances Mika would have been nothing more than a mention in time, Mika did eventually deliver , thank god, i would have hated for DC to have it or worse 2 more WC for MS..

Flying Finn

I completey agree that Mika was slower than Senna, absolutely no argument there (you think I'm that grazy!), IMO that's given but other team mates of his, no. When Mansell drove for McLaren, he wasn't faster than Mika.
Of course Mansell probably wasn't at his best anymore (I think very highly of Mansell btw) but you said Mika was much slower than his team mate. And unless we talk about Senna, I disagree.
Rosberg? He wasn't Mika's team mate, it's very hard to compare driver's in different cars, let alone from different era.
Before F1, Hakkinen was very good, him and Salo ruled on British F3 and i.e. in Macao he came second behind Schumi (after MS drove him into the wall).

PAULSPEED

Hi,
Well Chip Ganasi imported european drivers into american races. This
act made it look like Cahmp car was secound rate. I feel that both
series toss drivers around for more publicity.
Champ car and F1 drivers are all good but the publicity screws up everthing.
I saw Scott Speed race this summer and I feel he did the best he could
with the equipment he had. I think Seabass would do great in either weries
as long as he has the best equipment. The Newman/Hass team could
copete in F1 and win races if they had the budget of Macleran or Ferrari.
Paul

hacker-pschorr

The Captian (Penske) has said many times if they are able to bring the annual F1 budget down to around $80 million per season, he would start an F1 team. That would be a nice sight to see on the pit wall of an F1 race.

A.Wayne

FInn,
I would disagree about comparing the drivers. senna and mika was from the same era of cars and drivers so was mansel , rosberg etc. the comparision can be made . the speed rosberg had against his contemporaries , who i must add , was at a much higher level than when Mika and MS where competing. Rosberg had to competer against 5 WC and 3 WC to be.

I know all about Mika . H and Mika S. actually Mika S was who most thought was better ( myself included ) but Mika H is who got the break... But the most talented of them all to me had to be JJ lehto , who if he was given the chance to recover from his injuries( like Mika H ) would have had a strong F1 career , as i thought him to be better than both Salo and Hak.

Personally , i believe what saved Mika's Career , was that his injury came very early after the death of Senna , as Ron was devastated and vowed to help Mika .

JJ. Lehto did not have this Luxury as MS did not want him as a team MAte and with his speed you can understand why..

pole position

No,

If SB would be that good he would already be driving there unless you know more than F1 team bosses. The fact that he got only by a bottom tier,not top, team invited to test should give you a clue.

A top car is no guarantee for a podium finish. See Andretti or even better, when JV drove the Renault for a few races and barely beat backmarkers.............

A.Wayne

I would have to disagree with this , there is no team currently in champ or indy car that could compete at the current F1 level. Could it be done ? Yes , it would take a collective effort and it would take them 7-10 yrs to start winning . The results now american culture , would have a hard tme funding this. as you cannot get the accumulative , knowledge of Ferrari , Mcclaren , williams etc overnight , ASK TOYOTA

pole position

We are in agreement on MH. He did not show much, except being protected by Ron Dennis in his early F1 carreer and started winning, after a a couple gifted ones, races with the BEST car of the field in 98. In 99 the Ferrrari was on even terms with the Mac and if Irvine could take him to the wire in the lasty race than MS, without the broken leg incident, would have closed the show IMO and we all know what happenend in 00. That WDC was decided in the last race by pure driving talent not equipment.
I also question his mental make up, as shown on camera in Monza and his unspirited exit of the sport despite having a top car providing mediocre results.

But I am in total disagreement on Lehto with you, no way would he be a challenge to MS with consistency.

hacker-pschorr

So you are telling me Zsolt Baumgartner is a better driver than SeaBass? You must be since he was offered a ride, or did he buy a ride? I forget, how many people in F1 showed up with a large bag of money who were then placed into the car in front of someone who could out drive them? How dare I suggest such a thing happens in the highest tier of auto racing.

No way, the best 20ish drivers on the planet are in F1. Miraculously chosen by some divine power (might be the pope, not sure) to guarantee only the BEST drivers in the world step foot into an F1 car.

Michael Schumacher is the best, right? Did he win the race of champions last year? I forgot, did he? He’s the best of the best of the best, right? How about David Coulthard? How long has he been around again? Wow, he must have won this year’s race of champions then, since the F1 drivers are THE BEST!!!!! Bar none, no matter what, right?

I don’t follow DTM, on too late for my schedule. I’m assuming Jean Alesi and Mika Hakkinen must finish every DTM race 1 – 2 since they are the best of the best in some armature series driving tin tops.

Jean Pablo will win every NASCAR race next year, he better since he is one of the BEST!!!! 10 driver in the world (he was usually 10th or better, so going on that theory).

How about former F1 champion Jacques Villeneuve – HE BEAT SCHUMATHER IN 1997!!!! Oh My God, he is awesome then, since this is the best of the best of the best and he beat them all in 1997, right? So this year in NASCAR trucks I’m sure he will lap the field in every race, since, again, if you make it into F1 you are THE BEST!!!!


Funny thing is, I don’t like SeaBass very much He annoys me.

Geo

If you're referring to Michael, you're the only person who thought the McLaren was a top car that year. Virtually everyone else thought it was a dog.

Geo

As I've posted many times in the past, if you really want to evaluate who the best is or was, compare who someone had as teammates. While MS is clearly the most successful F1 driver in history, it's hard to say he was the best ever when you look at WCs and their teammates.

A.Wayne

well Pole position ,

Irvine would have been WC , if ferrari politics did not intervene costing him valuable points . also less not forget that mika salo , got in MS car after a 11 month layoff and put it on pole , " just like mike " then ferrari , f1 politics intervened again .. OK ,now I did not say jj was better than MS , i said ibelieve he would have been better than Mika , who won 2 WC, it was also obvious Michael did not want him as a teammate , just as he did not want Brundle (who raced the **** out of him on many occasions at beneton ) . In closing the last decade has been a bit foggy with all the bull**** manipulated WWF type F1 bernie and MAX show . i'm hoping with Michael's retirement , this will change...and we will get back to real racing again where it is obvious who is who and not who they wants us to see...


GEO in agreement !