Is Lewis Hamilton the greatest of all time, why or why not?

Mercedes gave him his first big break in 1990 when they recruited him to their junior team in the World Sportscar Championship to try to take him from Formula Three on a path that would lead to Formula 1. I recall an interview where he insinuated that he owed Mercedes for that, so was happy to help them. It wasn't about furthering his career, himself, or his brand, it was purely about providing assistance to Mercedes because they'd been there for him in the early days of his career.

By the selfish metric of modern drivers who are all about their brand, it doesn't make sense. By the metric of a man who honors those who provided him with assistance, it makes perfect sense.

All the best,
Andrew.

 

Hmm intriguing Jack. Set it up.
I guess it depends how much development we could do in the hypothetical era but on balance I would go for one clever and one fast.
Niki and Gilles?
Fangio and Moss?
Stewart and Clark?

Just to finish the LH thing, how about…


New thread: Is Lewis Hamilton a very good racing driver?

1st Post: For sure, very good, and given the right car he can win multiple championships.
2nd Post: There is no second post, we can all move on.

 

What is this "legacy" business you keep talking about? We never used to hear about that before.

It must be a notion invented by over enthusiastic fans to glorify somebody's career or, maybe by critics to dismiss it altogether.

I don't know if the interested themselves are worried so much about their "legacy".

 

I love Schumi. He's still all over my walls and his time in F1 is my favorite. It's very special.

Schumacher can say what he wants, but he didn't come back to F1 to simply develop a car. He came back because he thought he could be competitive. He really believed he still had his edge.

After the temporary excitement surrounding his possible substitution for Massa in 09', Schumi got the itch again. He wanted to race at Ferrari, but they believed he had been away too long to return to F1, and went with Alonso. When Brawn GP fell into Mercedes hands, Button and Barrichello wanted the kind of money a championship level team pays its drivers, which was reasonable given they won both titles. When they couldn't get the money they felt they deserved, they both left the team, and that put Mercedes buying the team in jeopardy. Ross called Schumi up and offered him the ride, and the rest is history.

It wasn't about developing the car. Any veteran driver could've done that. Mercedes and Schumacher both believed they could win.

 

I think people, myself included in 2010, underestimate how difficult it is to leave the sport and then come back and be on the pace. JV missed most of 2004 and was terrible. But I always felt JV sucked, so it didn't surprise me.

But when Schumacher came back in 2010, it became evident that you cant miss 3 years and have a complete change of formula and still be at the top. I don't know if it was just the lack of fire, lack of feel, lack of testing, or just how teams could test more and more with simulators and it hurt MSC, who had a natural ability to get close to the limit on track quicker than his competitors. Once upon a time a driver had to have the balls and talent to figure out if Eau Rouge was taken flat. Now drivers can determine in the simulator if certain corners are flat out or not before ever arriving at the track. In any case, Michael got thumped by Rosberg in 2010 and 2011 pretty easily. 2012 is not the same story when you dig into it. As it turned out, Schumacher was in fact the faster qualifier, which is pretty impressive since Rosberg proved to be faster than Hamilton at times. He had terrible luck in 2012, otherwise he likely could have had some pretty good results. Perhaps even a win in China if things went perfectly.

Rosberg has said a couple years ago that he couldn't come back to F1 and be competitive right away. Even being a recent F1 champion, he admitted he would still need to relearn the limits of the brakes.

Honestly it makes me respect Alonso even more, since he was able to jump back into F1 and pretty much immediately be quick. I don't think he's as complete as he once was, but he's still better than most of the drivers in current F1.

 

+1

I don't think Alonso has done bad but he's far from what we used to see from him. Flashes of brilliance here and there. And Alonso has been racing (everything!) in his ''off time".

Schumachers return had very high expectations, so anything below the expectations was deemed a failure. His 2012 was hugely underrated, and as you say, given Rosberg's own performance against Hamilton proves that Schumacher was far from slow. Not what he used to be, but still had competitive speed. You mention China a possible win in 2012, which is true...but lets not forget about Monaco, either! Remember that's arguably Rosberg's strongest track and Schumacher had a pole there! Sadly a penalty from the race before and being Grosjean'ed at the start quickly put an end to any hope of glory. The amount of bad luck he had throughout 2012 with reliability was insane.

 

Tin ear? I'm not a big fan of his music.

 

Don't forget gents that Alonso has done IndyCar and 24 hours of LeMans.

 

My interpretation is that it wasn't just car development, it was team development. Schumacher has experience winning multiple WDC and WCC, so knew exactly what support was needed from a driver and what a team should be providing to the driver. I'm sure his name in the team was also very helpful for recruitment on the technical side and important for establishing the culture of Mercedes. Schumacher was famous for his relentless work ethic throughout his company years and that's what Mercedes were looking for as a benchmark for their drivers.

All the best,
Andrew.

 

My latest list of GOATS

Fangio #1
Hamilton #2
Shumacher #3
Brabham #4
Ascari #5
Hill #6
Clark #7
Senna #8
Lauda #9
Prost #10

 

If GOAT means "Greatest Of All Time", how do you explain having several "GOATs" ?

By definition they should be only one. Or am I missing something ?

 

Which one? Twice WDC Graham, or Phil, or Damon ?

 

But reality is that he was way past his prime and got spanked by rosberg whom we know is not even as good as Michael was


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Wow Paul. Mad love for u but senna at #8. I know weed is legal in California but I think u need to lower ur consumption right now


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I'm always interested in seeing what people's top 10 or top 5 list is and I'm interested in the reasons. Could you tell me why you rank Brabham at #4? I never even considered him in my top 10, maybe there is something I haven't looked at.

 

In the end all of this is highly subjective.
I have my own list but this is only my opinion.
Just don't want someone try to impose his views like a truth.

 

It's always subjective, sometimes to more of a degree than others. But since we can never put all the drivers through an equal test at the exact same time, it's impossible to know how the top 10 list really is. A top 10 list is fun, until someone doesn't want to allow somebody else to have a differing opinion.

I enjoy the discussions because maybe I will learn something to make me re-evaluate my list.

 

Even team members that previously where in teams against Schumacher and went in genuinely HATING Michael, every single one of them changed their opinion after working with him and say it was utterly brilliant. I don't think there is another driver that has managed this so well. Schumacher remains the completely package for me. Driver talent, total dedication (to the point of devotion), technical insight, work ethic and charisma.

There have been drivers that matched him on driving talent, but not everything combined.

 

+100
You can add winning five WDC in a row with Ferrari (very high pressure) is enough to demonstrate what you are enumerate.

 

Personally, I always considered Jack Brabham as a cunning individual more than a highly skilled driver.
He owed his 3 titles to having the best/reliable equipment were others were not ready.
In 1959/60, he was #1 at Cooper, with the first mid-engine F1, light and nimble against the front-engine Ferrari by then completely obsolete. ,
In 1966, the change of formula caught most teams by surprise with a shortage of engines, bar Ferrari.
John Surtees should have won the title, but he divorced from Ferrari mid year.
Brabham with one of his cars, powered by an engine cobbled together from a Buick block was the only one ready.
Brabham is the proof that you don't need to be the fastest to win a title.

 

I would agree. However Brabham was the right guy at the right time- he's the cross-over from the 50' s to the 60's - and he was winning races up to his last year in racing.. something you really don't see much of. Brabham was also very engineering-focused like Dan Gurney. he is still the only person to win a race, WDC in a car of his own manufacture... so that is worth being in the top 10. He races all forms of racing as well but is really known for F-1.

 

I'll just post my GOAT - Jackie Stewart... he raced when it was super dangerous, usually finished, had several bad accidents and survived and won, and he did it with class and style... and he did not have to resort to running people off the road or in race accidents from " Hard Racing" .... anyone who can win at the Nordschliffe and win by 7 Min... is Very Good. that does not count his actual impact on racing across the world, and his "legacy" after he stopped driving. AND - he is perhaps the nicest guy you can ever meet ... Hamilton, Schumacher, Senna, Lauda, Prost ... are not. that for me says it all.

 

You're right! I used GOAT as the wrong term, I should have just said ranking.

 

Great question! The reason is not only was he a driver, but also a constructor. Brabham was behind a lot of the actual mechanics. It's as if Hamilton was the engineer and driver!

 

haha, I do admit, his death does add a lot of 'sympathy points' - I may reconsider. My list often changes.