Yes it can, Senna, Prost and Schumacher did so. Senna's last WDC was in a clearly lesser car, Prost in 1990 went to the penultimate race in contention, same thing, and Schumacher's first Ferrari was clearly brought forward by his skill. Today, you're correct that an inferior car can't challenge, 20 years ago it could. Of course Ferrari isn't in England, and without Ferrari there's no F1, period. Your posts referring to Italians as "stupid" just show that you're a racist bigot, nothing more. Would you call Lampredi stupid ? How about Columbo ? Who do you think designed and built all those V10's that won all those Championships ? Hint : it wasn't someone from England. The Brits need the rest of Europe to compete in F1 because they don't know how to build a competitive racing engine. They arrange for engines to be delivered to them from other company's located outside of England. Cheers mate. [/QUOTE]
What!?...... I'm pretty sure the Cosworth DFV remains the single most successful lump in F1 history. "Proudly designed, built & serviced in England old chap!" I guess the new Cossie is also British (?) - For a new unit, I think it's shown pretty well so far. Cheers, Ian PS - No need for name calling here IMHO.
There is nothing misleading about his 7 world titles. For most of his career, he put himself in the best team, had the team staff itself with the best talent to support him, and was usually the fastest driver on track. What is left to understand? Michael lived F1 and ended up the most successful at it. As far as the absolute greatest driver of all time....there are a handful that make the case and hopefully some more challengers coming along. I believe MS records will be broken also as most usuallly are. As to the argument of the Italians screwing up Ferrari....it's just the dumbest one you can make on this board in my opinion. Gee, if only GM or Leyland had taken over Ferrari life would be grand!!! LOL
Really? Not too many on here were looking forward to the disbanding of the dream team (Todt, Brawn, Schumacher) and replacing it with a mostly Italian crew. And some of the horrible blunders like Massa's refuelling in Sepang or the many missed tire calls and screwed up qualification sessions (both Ferraris stuck in Q3) confirmed those fears. Domenicali's position is still on thin ice after the disastrous 2009 and the once again botched qualifying where both Ferraris were held back in Q3. Any approach that preselects a certain group (in this case Italians) vs hiring the best who are out there is doomed to bring in suboptimal results. Also look back at the 21 year drought between Sheckter's and Schumacher's titles: A lot of that time was spent by running an Italian only organization. I remember reading comments in the newspapers of the eighties about Ferrari: Red Chaos and Red Casino were the headlines. Helmut Zwickl called Maranello "the house of the 1,000 lies" because they all blamed each other, but nobody dared to speak the truth as Enzo would have fired that person on the spot.
Phew... Barnard´s last cars left much to be desired. The F310B didn´t start the season much better than his other Ferraris, it only was developed faster along the season. But that was not Barnard´s work. In fact, Benetton really became a winning team after Barnard had left the building. And Ferrari too... Mmmm. BTW, where is Barnard now? Last time I´ve heard something about him he was designing bikes for MotoGP. Without much sucess must be said.
I´m a bit amazed of this stuff of the "dream team", yadda, yadda, yadda. The 2005 season of the "dream team" was a nightmare. And 2006 was not better than 2007 or 2008. But we are still dreaming of "the good old days", or even worse, longing for charismatic leaders. And we all know how leader translates into German...
2005 was a nightmare because the FIA/Bernie wanted a new person to win. TV viewership was going down with the boring 2004 season where Ferrari dominated at will. So they brought in the tire change rule, knowing that would be Bridgestone's and hence Ferrari's Achilles' heel. And it worked. Otherwise I'm pretty sure 2005 would have gone again to Ferrari and Schumacher. 2006 was the beginning of the end with LdM trying everything to force a decision out of MS, who didn't want to drive with Kimi in the other car. Lots of things happened and MS almost pulled it off. Also Alonso was now "battle hardened" as was Renault. But the Ferrari and the dream team were still very much a force to be reckoned with. After 2006 the dream team was disbanned in steps (first MS, then Brawn and eventually JT) and the effects were a decrease in Ferrari's power and dominance. It was a sheer miracle that Kimi got the title in 2007. Probably had more to do with behind the scenes dealing and McLaren deliberately failing Hamilton by "forgetting" to bring him in for new tires in China and adding an additional and unnecessary pitstop in Interlagos. They did that probably to avoid further penalties by the FIA. Just my theory. And I'm a Kimi fan, but that end to the season was scripted. 2008 the dreamteam was definitely gone and Ferrari out of contention. The one point difference makes the car look better than it was: The FIA gifted Massa about 15 points in Spa and Fuji. Trust me I'm extremely aware of that. Which is why I have an emotional problem when people proclaim MS the King or Kaiser. I don't think I'm much of a romantic when I look at the MS years at Ferrari. He was better than anybody else, as was Brawn and Todt. Has nothing to do with whether they were Italian, German, French, British or anything else. Just simply the best individual men performing at their peak as a team. I only get dreamy when it comes to the seventies and Gilles Villeneuve, but that's another story.
One of Michael's greatest talents was to surround himself with the best team. That's one thing he hasn't had time to do this time around. In his best Ferrari years everyone was quite loyal to him personally. A situation he cultivated.
Partly true. He probably thought he surrounded himself with the best people possible as his buddies Haug and Brawn run the team. Problem is, this is Mercedes and not a small team like Ferrari or Benetton (and I know Ferrari employees something like 500+ people, but the comment is in regards to how the team is run, at Ferrari winning is everything, at Mercedes you have to deal with Unions, board members and share holders). I'm pretty sure Rosberg wasn't on his list of codrivers, but since he came after Nico, he didn't have much choice.
In the past he was able to win every mechanic and tech over to "his" team. That takes time. At his age I can't see him having much impact on naming the #2 either, in that the team has to consider its future.
+100. And anybody that doesn't think Italians are stupid is well far more stupid. I love all things Italian, wish I was one (seriously) but I also love their stupidity, and recognise they couldn't manage their way out of a paper bag. I love all the weirdness of my 70's Alfa Romeo, and would only buy Italian cars if I didn't always need one that started . Once my current Alfa is restored I might buy all Italian ... but I need to finish that restoration first. Without Italians and their passion and how they design with passion/romance, etc. our world would be unbearably boring!, but thank God they are not running it Pete
How many Grand Prix wins have Cosworth had in the last 20 years ? Crickets Crickets.... As I said, the British need help with the most important aspect of "motor" racing...
When was this "downfall" ? The team seems to be holding up fairly well it would seem, please enlighten me will you...
Yes really ! You're walking on thin ice, agreeing with people who post stating that Italians are stupid. You should "moderate" these people, please do your job and stop encouraging this kind of talk. I think a word to other moderators is in order.
Mate, Andreas knows that I use the term stupid as a term of endearment. I of course in no way actually think they are completely stupid. If you had grown up as Andreas and I watching the crazy fiascos within the Ferrari team, you might understand where we are coming from. For example: For years the Ferraris were always the fastest on the back straight during practice, but were about 5th fastest on lap times. For all those years I just wished they would put more wing on and use any hp advantage to help cornering by being able to run more wing, but no ... they kept on with the "we are the most powerful and fastest on the straights" bollocks. This never really changed until JT got involved. Was really like Enzo was still controlling the team, ie. we build the best motors and the rest don't matter! Crazy! Pete
+1000 Mellow out Roger (Scuderia P1). By the way since you made the comment about how Moss and Enzo never liked each other, total crap. In Ferrari's Biography, he mentioned Tazio, Moss, and Villeneuve in the same breath, and what a great champion Moss was in Enzo's opinion even greater than Fangio. Had it not been for Moss's crash at Goodwood, Moss would have been driving an F1 Ferrari under Rob Walker's Colors. If you don't believe it, read Pilot Che Gente by Enzo himself. Regarding the Moss in Rob Walker's Car, read the Autobiography by Nigel Robeuk.
Huh? Nobody is saying Italians (as a people) are stupid. They are talking about how well one particular Italian F1 team was doing in relation to what the Italians and British were doing there. This isn't the "Ferrari only fan forum - any dissenters will be moderated or banned". It's a discussion forum. Andreas is about as reasonable a guy as there is. If you want a Ferrari only rah-rah site, this ain't the place for you.
I think some people only sees what they want to see. They forget that the Ferrari team had lot of fiascos but LOTS of wins too. They forget that Colombo, Forghieri and Enzo Ferrari were Italians too, and had serious brain fades, but lots of success. And the Brits had BIG blunts too: do you remember BRM? Jaguar? Leyland, Rover, MG, almost ALL the British car industry? BTW, I don´t care about the stupid Italians, I´m not Italian, but I could say too that New Zealands are sheep f*ckers and a few post later add that I say this as a "term of endearment", but maybe some kiwis can´t see the joke. I agree (partially) with Scuderia P1, we all know that despite being quite "vigorous" your vocabulary has not bad intentions, but we´re moving on thin ice. Of course, the moderator won´t agree with me, but that´s my opinion.
I have Met Moss on a couple of ocassions and found him to be very pompas and arrogant. He always seems to be harping on about what it takes to be a GP/F1 champ, pity he could not do it himself.
Actually I hate generalizations like "Italians are stupid" because they are as stupid or intelligent as any other nation. In that regard I'm not so happy with PSK's statement. That said, an approach that prefers one group of people (as currently with LdM's credo of building an all Italian team) simply doesn't hire the best people. The dream team was just that because it was assembled from the best people available who also happened to like each other and therefore work very well. As for the moderation part: You actually called PSK names yesterday. So careful please, we're all on thin ice here. At any rate, I would prefer if we all here could take it down a notch, particularly with the generalizations. Germans aren't always "machines of effectiveness" (see Toyota), Italians aren't just chaos (look at the 599XX) and there are even some Brits who know how to cook (chef Ramsey). BTW: The reason the Brits are so good at F1 is IMHO not that this is part of their DNA but simply because in the region around Silverstone a tradition was born even before WWII to tinker with anything motorized and take it from there. All these shops are influencing each other. People with experience and skills are only a phone call and paycheck away. Exact the same situation is true for the area around Modena with the Ferraris, Lamborghinis, Paganis, Bizzarinis, Stanguellinis etc. It is not in the water, it is merely a local tradition that breeds in itself and brings like minded/skilled/interested people together. There are many other examples like this, for instance the Swiss watch maker tradition around Neuchatel or the glass blowing industry in Venice etc etc.
Italians are not as stupid or intelligent as any other nation; in more ways than you can count they are much, much smarter.
Actually I really doubt that this stuff of building an all Italian team is deliberate. In most cases they just promoted the number 2 to fill the empty spaces. And still some big bosses are not Italian (Tombazis, Dyer). Later Luca invented that stuff of the Italianess of the team; who knows why, probably he´s not talking seriously, or maybe it´s true he wants to get into politics.
