I’ll be honest - I couldn’t stand Schumacher in his latter years. His lack of sportsmanship began to overshadow his on-track talent and I was glad he left the sport.
12 months later after a relatively insipid on-track World Championship I find myself getting a little nostalgic. I think Schumacher would have wiped the floor with any of this years contenders. Massa was a contender until the last two races of the season yet when Schumacher was his teammate Massa was nowhere near him. I feel we have a world champion who is not the fastest F1 driver available.
So what do you think? What would the results have been if Schumacher was still part of the F1 circus?
The best driver did not win the world championship this year, Lewis Hamilton lost out in Brazil.
Unfortunately for Lewis, his losing the championship coincided with the inevitable media backlash that was due following the media discovery of the fresh faced young star in the first few races of the season. We seem to need heros but equally a time will come when our hero turns out to be somewhat less than perfect and our response is inevitably to overreact to these perceived inadequacies. We overflate their ego on the way up, we undershoot on the way down.
Hamilton isn’t perfect, he has his human foibles. He is not whiter than white on the track, but neither has he done anything that puts him in the same league as Schumacher. He has coped with a sulking Alonso for most of the season combined with being thrust into the middle of an extraordinary espionage case.
Throughout the season he showed maturity and an unwillingness to bow down to his team-mate. I’ve lost an incredible amount of respect for Alonso this season and it disappoints me. Hamilton has grown in stature from the first race. The McLaren was the best car for the first third of the season and even while learning the tracks and the sport Hamilton exuded consistency. The Ferrari was the best car in the middle third of the season and Hamilton hung on to his lead. The Ferrari again edged most races in the final third of the season and but for one mistake by Hamilton and his team in China he could have won the championship. What happened on Sunday was “one of those things”, what happened in China was a mistake.
I’ve nothing against Raikkonen but I think his attitude for much of the season was deeply unimpressive. Hamilton now seems to be public enemy number 1 in F1 and the authorities threatening to ban three cars doesn’t help. Next year the circle will turn and we will go into the season with Hamilton again probably being a media darling.
Whispers around the Interlagos paddock might be suggesting that Lewis Hamilton is planning his biggest rule breach of the season so far for Sunday.
In an attempt to give himself an advantage over his title rivals it is thought that he might now be planning to strap a dirty big turbo to the back of his car to aid it’s performance.
Fresh from escaping his 2nd penalty yesterday for breaching tyre regulations across Friday practice sessions (despite the same punishment costing Ralf Schumacher in 2005), it is thought that the youngster is now fully confident he can push the boundaries that little bit further.
Insiders were allegedly heard saying “We have 3 means of justification for doing this. If we are caught we can use plausible deniability. If we can prove Lewis knew nothing about this then perhaps McLaren will get a fine of, say, $15,000. Secondly if they don’t buy the deniability then we can use the 2 precedents set already this season where clear rule breaches including a blatant safety rule breach in adverse weather conditions have been completely ignored and we’ve got away scot-free. Thirdly if they still don’t go for that we are confident that whatever punishment we get would be put onto our next race, which would be race 1 in 2008, and we’d be deserved champions by then”.
The turbo would give Lewis anything from 3 to 500 extra horsepower rendering his rivals as also-rans. But in this time of relaxed rule interpretations Lewis should be confident that he can get away with it. In fact there is no reason why he shouldn’t. If the FIA have shown anything this season it is that they are 120% behind Lewis Hamilton’s title charge and nothing, it seems, will get in the way of that.
I was contacted by a Abel Kahuni who is doing some doctoral research on the impact of performance on spectators recognition of F1 brands. Abel is looking for some people to fill out a short survey you can find here.
If you have a minute, please go fill it in. If you have any difficulty, please contact him by email
I’ve been very disappointed with Alonso and his attitude this year. As the World Champion in the best car with a rookie teammate he should have easily won the World Championship this year. He might still do it, but he has been completely overshadowed by Hamilton.
The year has been an endless series of moans and whining from the Alonso camp saying that McLaren did not give him the support he required. There have been allegations of Hamilton favoritism.
Do you think that would have stopped a Senna or a Schumacher or a Hakkinen? Great drivers are more than good pilots, they inspire a team and force a team to give them the resources they need. Any of the drivers I mentioned would have been ashamed to be beaten by a rookie, irrespective of how good the rookie was. Just think of all the challenges Hamilton faced this year - an unfamiliar car, tracks that were new to him, the pressure of the media, the pressure from Alonso and compare those to the behavior of the Alonso camp. Alonso has failed to get the team on his side and seems to have almost distanced himself from the team as the season went on. Those are the actions of a quitter.
If you’d asked me a year ago I’d have said that Alonso was probably one of my favorite drivers. Not any more and with a new generation coming through there are lots of drivers who I am more looking forward to seeing drive in the future.
Although many of you already know that the Etihad Aldar Spyker F1 Team has recently been sold to the consortium consisting of Strong Wind (the Mol Family) and Indian business tycoon Vijay Mallya for a reported $88-130 million, interim Spyker Cars NV CEO Hans Hugenholtz claims the company regrets needing to sell the improving Formula 1 team, but has done so in order to stabilize its core business of producing cars.
With the team once again changing hands and Vijay Mallya keen to insert a strong Indian flavour into his recent acquisition, there is now some idle speculation over exactly what colour the new team should be? Michael Maul, current CEO of Spyker F1, will probably wish to see the current predominant hues of Dutch orange remain as the Maul family is keen to capitalize upon the strong
Dutch support it currently enjoys.
With the new team yet to be renamed, there are several paths available to it, as it could choose a completely new paint scheme if so desired. Currently the major colours green and yellow are not in use, although there’s a plethora of red, white and blue cars occupying the grid. Thus the long ago original Irish green of Jordan Grand Prix’s 7UP days or eye catching Benson & Hedges yellow would be two excellent choices as both colours would stand out from the rest of the pack.
The national flag of India features orange, white and green which are also loosely tied to the colours of Ireland’s national flag. Interestingly the Irish orange is actually Dutch orange spanning back to William of Orange’s involvement in the pursuit of Irish liberty (editor - William was responsible for wrecking Irish liberty ). Thus the orange shade would tie both entities together nicely.
What the new owners will rename the team as is still a mystery with speculation suggests that Mallya’s Kingfisher brand will not be used due to potential commercial clashes. A Team India moniker may not be logical if Mallya has ambitions to create a world wide brand image outside of the sport.
Personally I enjoy the current colour scheme and hope that the predominant orange hues will continue on next year…
Lewis Hamilton today sensationally threatened to walk away from Formula One because he claims he has been made to look a “bad person”.
Hamilton, speaking after finishing fourth in both opening practice sessions for the Chinese Grand Prix, was reacting angrily to a threat that he may be penalised for alleged erratic driving in Japan last weekend.
Struggling to contain his emotions, the 22-year-old British rookie said: “There’s been some real strange situations this year where I’m made to look the bad person and, by the looks of it, this weekend I’ll probably be given a penalty.
“If this is the way it’s going to keep going, it’s probably not somewhere I really want to be.”
A fan caught the moment when Vettel hit Webber. The TV did not show clearly what happened, but this angle does.
Let’s remind ourselves of what the rules say
Article 4.10
“The safety car shall be used at least until the leader is behind it and all remaining cars are lined up behind him. Once behind the safety car, the race leader must keep within 5 car lengths of it (except under 40.13 below) and all remaining cars must keep the formation as tight as possible.”
The question has to be asked as to what Hamilton was doing? And it looks like Webber and Vettel were innocent parties here.
). Thus the orange shade would tie both entities together nicely. 
