Formula One - The best year ever? | Page 4 | FerrariChat

Formula One - The best year ever?

Discussion in 'F1' started by spirot, Apr 6, 2021.

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  1. I'd like to add Jim to the mix. :)
     
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  2. william

    william Two Time F1 World Champ
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    Jun 3, 2006
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    I was afraid it would come to that ! People having disagreement about their prefered year or driver.
    Nothing new on this forum. Everyone is entitled to his opinion.

    Who is this "Michael Jeffery Jordan" ? I have never heard of him. What has he to do in this discussion?
     
  3. 71type65

    71type65 Rookie

    Nov 30, 2020
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    71type65
    #78 71type65, Apr 10, 2021
    Last edited: Apr 10, 2021
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    Many good years before the now-stifled V6 turbo era. I say bring back the glorious sounds! But for me it was 1978.

    My all time favorite Lotus World Champs (my road car at the time was a Europa, soon to be an SCCA race car). Capped off many years of class leading technical innovations with ground effects in the form of the Type 79 Black Beauty - rightfully called the most elegant F1 car ever built. Not to mention an American World Champ for a change, Mario.

    But really the whole scene. Plenty of diversity in engines, chassis, etc as others have pointed out. I still have the JPS Lotus team mechanic's shirt that I bought directly FROM THE TEAM at Watkins Glen 1978. Back then you could walk through the garage, cars and teams were just inches away. No big "official team logo" vendors, just the mechanics themselves selling various souveniers, used shirts, old spark plugs, cracked body parts, wings, etc. I assume it was for beer money. My shirt was owned by the head mechanic. Yes they were rock stars, but accessible rock stars.

    A couple years later, I was an accessible non-rock star. With a Lotus, of course...
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  4. Natkingcolebasket69

    Natkingcolebasket69 F1 World Champ


    I don’t really mind whose favorite driver ; as u said everyone is entitled to their own opinion and has different experiences.

    What bothers me is to lend me words I have not used. I don’t think senna was a god or a nice guy, or perfect as a driver;)Heck I met Schumacher in Monterey the year before his accident and to someone in his circle he seemed to be rather unfriendly.

    I do think if there was an ideal and hypothetical season with all the guys from his era 84-94 driving the same car he would come on top. PURE fantasy of course.

    Each era has different heroes. I loved the 90’s and late 80’s but people thinking the Hamilton era is boring well... this was also pretty boring too if u were not into Prost Or senna; every 2 weeks it was either of them winning not too much suspense There.
    I am too young to have witness the greatness of Clark but by all accounts he seems surely deserving of all accolades he got.


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
     
  5. furoni

    furoni F1 World Champ

    Jun 6, 2011
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    Pedro Braga Soares
    car yes, fuel not :)
     
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  6. furoni

    furoni F1 World Champ

    Jun 6, 2011
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    Pedro Braga Soares
    Gilles was a bit of a probelm to the "old man", on one side, he loved him as a driver and as a person, and he was by far the best driver out there, but on the other, he was clearly outperforming the Ferraris he was driving, and all the credit for the victories was his, they were Gilles victories while driving a turd, and that was making Enzo look bad, to him, no one could be above Ferrari, not even Gilles, That's why he didn't criticize Didier after Imolo, he said to Gilles " Gilles, in teh end a Ferrari won, and that's the most important"..,and that finishid Gilles love with Ferrari, i can't remenber where i saw it, but it seems Gilles was probably heading to Mclaren, Ron had tried to lure him before, ofering him a stupid amount of money, but Gille sfelt bas leaving, so he asked an even crazyer summ....if i have the time i will put the story here...
     
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  7. spirot

    spirot F1 World Champ

    Dec 12, 2005
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    Tom Spiro
    I would say that back in the 80's especially 84 it was still a sport that was entertaining... but still a competition between men and machines... today its truly a show.
     
  8. spirot

    spirot F1 World Champ

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    Hold on here. so a couple of things:

    I know you did not say Senna was God, but many eulogize him today to the point that he's so revered that you cant have a realistic discussion. MY point is he was not as good nor as bad as some believe.... great yes - the greatest - no.

    Senna's accident - clearly it was a mechanical breakage yes - but I think had he not been under so much pressure, he may not have been pushing so hard on cold tires, with a known twitchy car that he was not happy with nor understood.... Schumacher was putting on the pressure and Senna was responding. that is my point. I don't think anyone disputes the bottoming out of the car, the cold tires and the speed at which he was going when the racing resumed ... Many forget that those cars were to have Active ride - and FIA took it away for 94, so they were all coping with normal suspension set ups....in basically a car designed for Acive suspension ... the aero balance was not good. I would recommend you read Adrian Neweys book - he covers that weekend in detail both from the human perspective and the actual car prep. if you go by the Movie - you get a distorted view point. its not incorrect but leads you to believe it was the car 100%. given that Senna had so many accident in his career - he was used to taking chances.

    You point of Senna being the fastest in any car etc... i just disagree with. Jim Clark or Jackie Stewart were just as good - if not better.
     
  9. spirot

    spirot F1 World Champ

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    Tom Spiro
    I get your point. I think one has to look at it from Enzo Ferrari's perspective. He's been there done that - and been through the whole losing a driver to an accident. I think at that point he was as you stated more concerned to win over anything else. Frankly if one of his drivers was WDC - that was nice but as long as they won the constructors championship he was happy. As it turns out in 82 - they did win the constructors Championship - in 83 as well. hardly a turd car.

    Villeneuve was not always out performing the car... he had a great car in 79 - and was so wild that he literally tossed away the championship. consistency in placing is what helped Sheckter to win... in 80 the car was a total turd... in 81 improved and in 82 it was a winner if fragile. the 80's were actually more successful than many think or know. WDC constructors 82 - 83, and 2nd in 85 and at least 3rd or more in 87-89....

    the real culprit was Marco Piccinni who was Enzo's "representative to the team".... this was who caused a lot of the problems.... He was the son of Enzo's banker, in Monaco -so was more "french" than Italian, and liked Pironi better. Villeneuve really put his trust in the wrong people.... Even Piero was sidelined by Piccini....
     
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  10. Natkingcolebasket69

    Natkingcolebasket69 F1 World Champ

    Fair enough, that being said I don’t go by the movie.
    There are pictures of the steering column broken in half and onboard showing senna steering left and NOTHING happened. I’m not talking about the onboard that they show everywhere, more was shown during the William’s trial.
    Futile though to compare all the drivers from different eras, maybe Jim or Jackie were faster but imo in the same car ... no;)


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
     
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  11. ingegnere

    ingegnere F1 Veteran
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    Sep 12, 2004
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    Montreal
    Was going to mention this when posting the pic of BT52–which was pretty unconventional but cool looking—but of course some people here would dispute this because it is only Ferrari who bend the rules while the others are just clever. ;)
     
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  12. jpalmito

    jpalmito F1 Veteran

    Jun 5, 2009
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    mathieu Jeantet
    England-based teams are always fair plays, especially when they win..:D
     
  13. spirot

    spirot F1 World Champ

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    I get it, I've read Newey's book on the accident. so the official story is that there was sheer in the column, and coupled with lower tire pressure, cold tires etc... caused the loss of control. however its very hard to say was the break / sheer the cause of the accident or from the impact? long and short his death was the penetration to the brain.... I still maintain that the Williams was very twitchy as it was converted from active to non-active, extremely aero sensitive, and to ride height. the year before the car was amazing because of its active suspension... when all that was scrapped Williams hurt the most, because their car was so well developed for active systems. Senna clearly could not dial into the car, nor could the engineers figure out what was happening. Newey goes on to talk about the excelled feedback from Senna that jived with all the telemetry. ... meaning snap over or understeer. I think Newey's final thought was that it was a combination of ride height and suspension pick-ups that made the car dart to the right. the steering column and wishbone were from the impact... 3 cm left or right, Senna could have likely survived and be talking about it today.

    I don't believe that its futile to compare drivers of different ages. I think you have to quantify results and actions to come up with the best. While Senna was God Gifted no doubt, he also had deep flaws that came out when he ran people off the road. When Schumacher came around he was getting a dose of his own medicine. He's even admitted to running Post off the track... ON PURPOSE... that to me is not action from the best driver ever. Simply not acceptable. that flaw alone means he cant be the best.

    People like Fangio, Clark, Stewart, Lauda, Prost - NEVER did that they were fair but respectful and safe. I name mostly older drivers because the penalty for driving someone off the track was very high ( death) ... today its literally just a numerical penalty vs. your life.
     
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  14. 375+

    375+ F1 World Champ
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    Dec 28, 2005
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    +1 that is why many drivers from earlier times do not respect some of the more recent WDCs.
     
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  15. Bas

    Bas Four Time F1 World Champ

    Mar 24, 2008
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    +1

    And regarding the crash (cause), I also agree with you. Newey's aggressive designs quite often are unstable buggers...not because he can't design a car but because physically, that's the fastest the car can be given the parameters. The flaw in his design (if you can call it that) it needs a superhuman driver to get the most out of it. Go back to much more recent cars and look at the 2019/2020 cars he's done...they where so damn twitchy and neither Albon or Gasly (neither one could be described as ''incompetent'') just couldn't handle the car. Webber quite simply could never gel with the blown diffuser either. Each time it was reduced or removed, he tended to be a step closer to Vettel.
     
  16. spirot

    spirot F1 World Champ

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    Tom Spiro
    yes correct.
     

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