Greatest F1 Driver Ever?

Ayrton used to say the samething about Fangio as you just did. Sterling Moss always said that Fangio will always be remembered as the greatest as well (24 out of 51 Race Wins).

 

Dont forget 29 pole positions, over 50% of the time he started at the front compared to 25% for Schumi. Personally, people underestimate Ide, Sato, and Yamamoto, they should also be some of the best all time.

 

What do you know!!!??? Everyone knows that "Santeria" is where the money's at.

...a distant second is "Snake-Handling"!


....then the others.

 

Valentino Rossi

 

Nuvolari, game over, the rest were just opportunists if you sit back and look at the era they raced in from the 10,000' level .... although you must hand it to Schu for dragging Ferrari kicking and screaming into a formidable team with the help of Napolean and Brawn

Nuvolari wons races in cars he had no right to win

 

I would have to go with Phil Hill
F1 World Champ. , Lemans winner several times, Carrera Pan.........
And a great guy to boot!!!!!!
Reading his book on how he raced the carrera has got to be one of the most "trying" races for a race car driver!!!!

 

I completely agree. Mario has really been overlooked, I think he is fantastic and has competed in almost every form of racing... I think he is missing Rally and thats about it.

I think if you want the best of all times, then you have to look all forms of motorsport.

In F-1 I think Fangio has no comparison... when you take into account how hard the cars were to drive back then, the danger, the tracks they drove on there is no comparison.

Fangio
Clark
Stewart
Senna
Schumacher

but overall I think it has to be Andretti. after him Stirling Moss...

 

different eras. this is a hard thread. those days, there's no seat belts, no helmets, no balaclavas, no gloves, no fireproof suits.

anyone who won back in those days, can be considered the greatest. Fangio and Moss up there.

fast forward to modern era. cars capable of over 350 km/h. bulletproof helmets and fireproof overalls. over 4 gs in each corner. 70 laps, 70 times the same corner and same g force. yet, one mistake, and u'll be crashing over 100 mph.

yes, the cars are safer and all. but still, the risk are pretty much the same. 50 years ago, when u step in an F1 car, u don;t know if ur gonna step out of it alive. the same thing applies today.

it's really hard to see who's the greatest of all time.

 

Yeah but the fact is a death while racing back then was considered common. Now, there hasn't been a death while racing since back in 1994 when Senna and the other guy crashed. Also, oldschool drivers maintain that nowadays the cars are much easier to drive.

 

easy yes, but it's more taxing than those days. question is, can they handle it for say 60-70 laps, w/out errors?

 

Absolutely. I recently watched the interviews on the DVD of Grand Prix. They had all those drivers working on the movie, and they have interviews with Bondurant, Moss, and Gurney. The rest of the guys are dead. It's actually a little chilling to see Bruce McLaren and Graham Hill in the film.

And Moss still thinks Foyt ruined it by making it safer! The guy's a nut!

 

Yes Brian they could. Jackie Stewart and Jim Clark are considered two of the greats because they rarely (I mean rarely) made errors. They wouldn't spin off, or make little mistakes. In addition, they had to change gears manually and didn't take a break while having a pit stop.

 

It wasn't Foyt it was Jackie Stewart who pushed safetly along.

 

what i meants was Tony, handling these days F1 cars, 60-70 laps, which is very taxing, and made no errors.

 

Ok Pal.

 

I realized my list was not accurate nor complete, so here is the revised list:

Schumacher
Senna
Prost
Lauda
Rindt

 

Excellent choices!!!!!!

 

Thanks. I realized I forgot one of the best, you probably do not like him.

 

I'd also toss in an observation one retired '70s driver made: the cars Stuart and Clark and their predecessors drove tended to run closer to (and often beyond) the 'edge of the envelope' in terms of grip, handling, performance and reliability than modern cars, making the driver's job a bit more complex and difficult.

Now, not everyone believes it, but I think there's something to this idea - being fast in earlier eras meant more than simply wringing performance from the car.

 

Yes they were in a constantly controlled 4 wheel drift, but it was controlled and you could not see it from just watching it.

Ron, for all I say about the others, there is no doubt in my mind that MS was the greatest driver of his generation, and possibly the greatest of all time.

 

Four times a year - every quarter - we get this SAAAAAME question, and it always comes back to the SAAAAAME drivers, every time, no matter what.

 

Stewart championed safety after his horrendous crash at Spa in 1966;Graham Hill was killed in a plane crash in 1975 together with an up and coming driver (Tony Brise), not behind the wheel of a car....

 

Your right, thanks...(I am a noob)

 

See post above...

 

Is a noob a newbie????