In the words of Lew-Ham, "Quote"

A certain member on here stopped posting after this ..
[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mlJWwuV9eBw&NR=1[/ame]

 

+ 134

fantastic post

In my view, TWO things are required to make a GREAT driver : talent (or skill), and judgment. Hamilton excels at one, and fails miserably at the other. The lack of good judgment is evidenced by his attitude ... both on the track, and off.

This thread is about his "quotes" ... the most recent of which, stills astounds me : all of these collisions can be avoided, if he would just qualify higher! This demonstrates not only a fundamental misunderstanding of the problem he's having, but also demonstrates a very reckless & dangerous attitude on the track. You simply can't just "equate" Hamilton's recent series of collisions with any & all accidents that happen during a Formula 1 race. There's a fundamental judgment ... and attitude ... problem here, that's reflected not only in his driving, but in his off-track attitude.

Lewis has incredible talent. But in my opinion, he needs to stop worrying about "Hamilton the brand", and start focusing on "Hamilton the driver" ... before someone gets hurt.

 

If Hamilton was more aggressive and more accident prone than any of the other drivers, the above line of reasoning would have merit. But he isn't... he had 2 incidents in Montreal, one of which was his fault. Vettel had 2 incidents (practice crash and spin-out at the end). Button was in 2 crashes. Both Force Indias were in numerous crashes each, as were the STR's and others (Massa and Alonso).

The only driver and incidents being talked about post-Montreal are those of Hamilton. None of the others. Because he is the most visible and polarizing driver.

The underlying data is flawed (that he causes more incidents than other drivers and earns more penalties). The same was said last year, and I found the actual data and posted it, which showed Ferrari/Alonso had earned more penalties to that point than McLaren/Hamilton. And if the underlying data is flawed, the conclusions drawn from that are also flawed.

For some, their judgment is not only clouded but opaque. For others, there is some level of bias. For some, there is no bias... but it's safe to say that overall there is most definitely a negative predisposition a majority have towards Lewis and his actions. Which is why the fact that he had less incidents than other drivers during the Montreal weekend, yet the reaction would suggest otherwise.

That bias and willful ignorance on the facts will carry over to the next race as well.. people will be talking about "how Lewis crashed out Massa in Monaco, and Button in Montreal", despite those things not being true.

It's really no different than how some people *still* cling to the idea that Alonso was not given equal treatment at McLaren next to Lewis, despite Alonso *himself* stating that isn't true.

When you have people basing their dislike of a guy on angst about another liked driver being screwed, and then ignoring the fact that said liked driver even confirmed their beliefs as wrong, you know that reason and pragmatism are no longer part of the discussion.

Which is precisely why Hamilton should continue to do exactly what he has been doing thus far.

 

Is it a negative predisposition against Hamilton that sees his collisions as something separate & distinct from the others ... or a positive predisposition in favor of Hamilton that "glosses over" all incidents in a race, and concludes something like: "This is racing, and accidents happen ... they're all the same. No reason to ever single out any particular driver."

Again, this thread is about his quotes ... and i'd suggest that his post-race quotes (in addition to his bad judgment on the track, which is happening with increasing frequency) tend to support the view that Hamilton has a unique (and dangerous) problem on the track.

 

Webber lost a championship last year due to unnecessary crashes, and he very much rose up through the ranks driving slower machinery.

Alonso lost the 2007 championship by letting his aggressiveness get the better of him, and he is also a guy who very much came up through the ranks.

Vettel very nearly lost the championship last year due to aggressiveness and unnecessary crashes, and it was only the cheating and subsequent ineptitude of Ferrari that allowed him to win, and Vettel came up through the ranks at STR as well.

Clearly, the evidence does not support the idea that a driver who "learns" (what, to be slow?) at a lower team will be somehow more seasoned and able to win better when they reach a top-shelf team.

The claims that Hamilton should have somehow learned the ropes at a lesser team are based on some misplaced desire for "fairness" in F1. It is the same as when people get upset at a greater power in a military conflict and suggest they are acting wrongly by winning. F1 is not and has never been about fairness - it is about winning. Make no mistake, if Ferrari or Red Bull knew of a guy outside of F1 who could come in and run like Hamilton, they would hire him in a second. And make no mistake also that the people who claim that Hamilton's course was stunted (read: unfair) because he went right to a top team would have no problems with it if that driver was kicking ass at their favorite team.

Guys like Webber and Alonso need to learn that too - except nobody is calling for that, because this isn't an objective review of Hamilton's talents and career, but just another reason to take away from his success

If Alonso and Webber and others are not past this stage, why on earth should Hamilton be? They are all winners (well, wanna-be winners in the case of Webber) . A racing driver who does not go for it is what we call Felipe Massa - and they get dropped for sucking. A racing driver who does go for it are guys like Schumacher and Senna and they win championships.

Hamiltons fault was trying to win the race in the first few laps - but even the seasoned pros like Webber give him credit where it is due, and his incident with Lewis was a minor mistake. It is only on the Internet where the experts point out that Hamilton

-should be banned for the season
-is a rookie driver, above his head in a car that exceeds his talent
-got lucky winning his WDC
-is going to kill someone
-only won at McLaren because they stiffed Alonso to make that so (Alonso is obviously wrong and doesn't know what he is talking about when he says he was never treated less than equally)

and on and on


Amusing to witness these argument, but not very well presented

 

This is the only real problem Lewis has, imo. But the reason he presses so much is that he believes Vettel will get away from him and he'll lose the chance to take him on. I don't really disagree with that, but he needs to find a way to pursue Webber while respectfully coexisting with the rest of the field.

Curiously, I wonder what would have happened had Lewis closed the door on Button and crashed him out? Logic can be fickle, it seems...

 

Isn't that what Schumacher did to Rubens last year?
http://youtu.be/gmD050RhOEY

 

Have you ever seen Prost try to win a race in the first few laps?

The answer is never (once he also matured).

There is a reason why Prost was/is far more successful than Alonso, Webber and Lewis ... he learnt. The only person on the grid that can honestly be considered the same level as Prost is Michael Schumacher, the others are way below Prosts ability.
Pete

 

+4 WDCs

 

Cool, calm, collected

At least two of these things Lewis is not

 

Will ScuderiaP1 create a thread for every one of these drivers? Or is it the case that since he secretly has a crush on Lewis Hamilton, these poor drivers won't get their very own threads?

http://en.espnf1.com/f1/motorsport/story/50793.html

 

Too early to say that about Alonso & Hamilton...they still have a lot of driving left in their careers.

Also, Prost is only the #3 driver of all-time in terms of WDC's, so it won't exactly be an indictment of their skills if neither Alonso nor Hamilton wins 4 or 5 WDC's. Put either of them in the best car on the grid and they'll have a title.

 

Here Scud, I'll throw you a bone, coz it made me laugh.

Courtesy of sniff Petrol.
Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

LOL, that's pretty funny.

 

Hamilton is probably a worse driver than those in the bumper cars.

 

People have been wrong to rubbish Lewis,’ Ecclestone said.

‘What we want is people racing, and all the people who watch it want that. If you analyse what's been happening and how other drivers have been performing, Lewis shows up very well, and so do Sebastian (Vettel) and Jenson (Button).

So let him race. That's what people like him do. I was very, very good friends with Senna, and if you look at what he did, he was a racer too, and people had to move over for him,’ the 80-year-old told The Independent.


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/formulaone/article-2004328/Bernie-Ecclestone-defends-Lewis-Hamilton.html




http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/formulaone/article-2004328/Bernie-Ecclestone-defends-Lewis-Hamilton.html

 

Lol, the man can do no wrong. Imagine if it was MS or FA playing bumper cars for two races straight? I'm sick of the whole Lewis gets a free pass because he is a "racer," which is a stupidly vague and ambiguous term. They're all racers, you can win races and titles without being overly aggressive.

 

Free pass what you on about, tell that the FIA!!!

If you think nice fluffy cloudy baby nice type drivers win Multi WDC's.

Good luck with that. Give me ballsy ruthless bad boys anyday of the week.

BTW I put Alonso in my category.

 

I meant free pass on this website...

Anyway, you're misconstruing my statement. I agree that you need to have an element of ruthlessness to win titles (I am a huge MS fan), but there is a fine line between agressiveness/ruthlessness and making idiotic mistakes and playing bumper cars race after race trying to make too much happen. I can name plenty of drivers that don't fit the "Senna mold" and won WDCs, even multiple WDCs.

 

There was as much drivel coming from you in that post, than you claim was coming from LHs farther.