If that were true, Alonso would have four titles and counting with Mercedes and be a six times champion! Hehehehe
Actually, we saw Christian Horner questioned on sky tv about elton visiting the red bull garage and offices, and he categorically explained that red bull have no interest in elton, and that he was politely advised there was no room at the inn. Elton himself admitted as much later that year when questioned as I remember, but claimed that he wa one of several top drivers that tried to get a ride there and that he didn't mean it, he was only joking around, mclaren was his ultimate team and they'd be back. Pretty much simultaneously the Mercedes cat was out the bag
Yes, but the best "you could get" does not necessarily mean the best who is out there Alonso and Vettel were both in contract and both happy with their employer by that time, Ricciardo was allmost a Rookie by the time and Max was still searching for his first public hair....So Lewis was the best option at that moment as he was more than willing to leave McLaren...That does not mean that Mercedes was afraid that they would have only success with Lewis signing. And the "fans" of Lewis do not get that the guys mentioned above would have done the job just as well...Winning in the Mercedes is not necessarily a sign of greatness unless you want to put Rosberg in the list of the true greats... So Lewis won three out of four titles in the dominant Mercedes...so congratulations and job well done, but please make not more out of it than it actually is.
please quit trying to insinuate Merc was built under Hamilton. he didn't do squat. that V6 beast engine was under development years before he even thought about leaving Mclaren
Can you see the flaw with your logic, here is a clue, ask yourself which driver won multiple WDC's without having a dominant PU .
Hi Steve, I'm OK thanks. Good to see you back and keeping your end up! Hope you are fully recovered and fighting fit.
Course, they all like to pop at vettel, but he merely had an aero advantage with his car, he didn't have an engine that was the absolute most powerful. Elton has an aero disadvantage with following traffic, but in clear air, that engine is 50bhp minimum better than the rest, in qualy mode even more. Then go back, the BMW engines in the Williams of Montoya and ralfie were more powerful than the ferrari of the tine, yet Michael still managed to beat them with skill and guile. Elton does nothing over and above what Nico has done, hence, he is no better than Nico, so unless Nico is a contender for greatest ever, then elton isnt
Obviously every multiple WDC had a dominant car at a time of his career, so far it is true...But only because every "GOAT" had a dominant car does not mean everyone winning in a dominant car multiple times is a GOAT as well. The inversion of the argument simply does not work! So there are two guys: one is working his ass off for several years in countless testing sessions to make a crap car that did not even finish his first GP into a winning car, the other guy is celebrating the jetset life over the winter break coming to the first test in January and the car is a second faster and more reliable than every other car on the grid. Whose achievement would you rate higher? Here is a clue: one of the two is the guy questioned here in this thread... But I think we can repeat this to the end of days: apart from signing his contract Lewis did absolutely nothing to make the car he is driving a winner. And for all those thinking it was Lewis making the difference at Mercedes ask yourself who won the first 2 GP for Mercedes? Here is a clue: it is NOT Lewis
Lewis was able to sign that contract because of his ability. I have gotten to run karts with both NASCAR and F1 champions, I've also gotten to run with the struggling talent attempting to work their way up. Some of those struggling talents just cannot match the champions, they make a good story about how if they were in a better car, blah blah blah. Some of those struggling talents are as good as the champions, but not many. Ability gets signed, that jet set life that Lewis appears to lead is based on extreme ability. Nico was also an exceptional talent in racing. He could of done well at other teams. Look at Nico vs Schumacher. Then figure that Nico vs Schumacher was about as close as Nico vs Hamilton. Is Hamilton the GreastestOAT? I do not presume to give *any* F1 driver that title. But Hamilton is certainly one of the greats of our time, if not the greatest of our time. He wouldn't-er-a gotten a three year deal for $100,000,000.00+ in 2012 if Hamilton had not been one of, if not the best. If Mercedes knew they had the field easily beat by having such a superior car for 2014 they wouldn't-er 'ave spent such fancy amounts for a race driver. They could of just gotten a hot female sports model if it were that easy to win with that car. Hamilton got into great cars by being an outstanding driver. He didn't "luck into them". It didn't take Vettel long to get into championship winning cars in F1. Top drivers will filter to the top grid spots. (Pay drivers excepted, they go to who ever wants/needs the money).
$100,000,000.00+ to drive a car for three years. Just think about that. If you knew you'd have a car seconds a lap faster than the rest of the grid; would you make that hire? $5M would expose you to a large/good talent pool that would easily still win with a car seconds faster per lap. The comments from Lewis detractors include that he has a bad personality, looks ugly, and has bad taste in dress. That $100,000,000.00+ must be all down to his driving talent then.
They pay elton for his perceived marketability as well. He was able to take his past as a f1'champion to the team, he was young enough to last, and Bernie and the rest were marketing him to America and such. That's it. Champions get paid lots, otherwise they don't go anywhere, that's the rules of life. What do you think Vettel gets for being at ferrari despite rare results, what about Alonso before him?
Vettel. He's won 4 of them despite having an engine that produced the fewest horsepower, up against Mercedes great power and broad powerband (so very drivable) and Ferrari's high peak power but narrower powerband.
Hi Bas, yes I knew that one was coming, I had written a longer version of that, but for some reason it all went tits up writing it out, some glitch in the system maybe, plus I didn't have the time. I'll try to summarize it. Multi WDC winners have had a car that has been cleverly built, either with flexi wings, holes in double diffusers ect, or maybe a clever interpretation of circumventing rules. So it begs the question how do you measure true greatness, you can use teammate comparisons, but assigned number 2 drivers can put paid to that. All in all I'd say Hamilton fairs pretty damn well in most of those aspects, however having said that I'am not disputing that lets say, Vettel Alonso Max ect, could achieve the success Hamilton has had in the Merc.
It is your opinion that Lewis did zero to help develop the car, it may be the case, but I figure he must play some part in giving feedback ect. Take pole positions for example. Image Unavailable, Please Login Ham 72 MS 68 Senna 65 Vettel 50 Try as you might want to, but would you not think it is undeniable that those stats could not be achieved, without the ability of the man in the car... His Jet set lifestyle, well you can hold that against him if you want to, it's certainly not in my nature though, so good luck with it.
Look...and I have never said anything different. But for some reasons I was labeled hater (by some) for that.... So maybe Lewis is a great, maybe not...I think one can not judge alone from the success with the Mercedes and the stats resulting from that.
I think true greatness can be measured by a series of standout performances. That's why for me, Schumacher remains at the top of the chain. He's done so many truly great things with cars that just really shouldn't have been possible. Monaco 1994, Spain 1996, Spa 97, 98, Imola 2005...(you can see where I'm going with this). I don't count Vettel as a true outlandish great yet either (even though you know I'm a big fan of him), though he's had some great performances, most notably of course his win in the STR Monza 2008, Fuji 2007, Brazil 2012, Monaco 2012(? the one where he had to keep the whole pack behind under huge pressure) Singapore 2013... Hamilton's best race to date remains (to me) the 2008 Silverstone GP, he truly was fantastic that day pains me to admit it...but I do seriously struggle to think of any other truly outstanding drives. There's no doubt that he's a pretty damn good driver, how else can you snatch that many poles and wins. But I just don't see him as a true great. Statistics only tell so much of a story. Alonso I consider better, he has the speed and a ''smarter'' driver. Love him or hate him he really is extremely clever in positioning his car, knowing when to attack, defend or not...Last week's Brazilian GP despite only finishing 7th, was one of his greatest drives IMO. The entire race he spend staying within Massa's DRS. As soon as he lost that he'd have finished much further behind and definitely not in 7th. Max in his short career and young age has done some great drives, USA 2015 in the wet, Barcelona 2016 holding off Kimi in a car he didn't know, lap after lap knowing how to position his car properly and use the battery just the right amount so Kimi couldn't mount an attack, very obviously Brazil 2016, Malaysia overtaking Hamilton (I believe together with Vettel and Kimi makes him the only driver to have done so since 2014 era started) and winning, dominating the Mexican GP a few weeks ago...Obviously he's not a great due to lack of wins and no championship to speak of (yet), but IMO he'll be the knocking on the list of all time greats in a few years.
When coming out in January 2014 for the test the Mercedes was much quicker out of the box. What would be the input of Lewis on that date??? Why are you guys repeating that stuff over and over again. Nobody said that Lewis is not a good driver but you might want to add that in the time Lewis was driving for Mercedes against Nico he had 35 against 29 poles of Rosberg...So obviously the car had a very high affect on this stats as Nico is 8th of all time at poles while driving in the SAME car as Lewis. Name a team mate of the other names above where you can say the same! I do not hold his lifestyle against him, where do you get this from? I do not care whether he is on a party or at home watching television. Fact is that Schumacher was on the track testing and therefor he had far more share in the dominance of the car than Lewis has. It is not Lewis fault that there is no testing but nevertheless one should not say that Michael lucked into the dominant Ferrari the same way Lewis, Nico and Seb did!!!
Pete, maybe Mercedes Benz culture is one where drivers are not allowed to say "come in early and stay late" and get to know the inner mechanics and electronics of the car as opposed to Ferrari's culture where drivers like Vettel do get to know the "innerds" of the car.
https://thejudge13.com/2017/11/15/lauda-hamiltons-car-advantage-last-3-years-could-even-make-me-champion/ Lauda: Hamilton’s car advantage last 3 years could even make me champion Rather unsurprisingly Niki Lauda is full of praise for his now four-time world champion Lewis Hamilton after securing his 4th drivers Championship, 3 of which for the Mercedes team. The Austrian non-executive chairman of Mercedes reveals that there was zero friction between Hamilton and Bottas this year. Obviously it helps when one is rather slower than the other but both did not get in the way on the track. Quite different than in 2016, when Hamilton and Nico Rosberg broke down into a veritable guerrilla war. “Hamilton and Bottas are not friends, but they do not hate each other” Niki Lauda told Gazzetta dello Sport. The ex-driver in Lauda obviously never far from the surface revealing “That was just unfavourable for the team but not for the drivers back then. On the contrary, they had given each other the desire to go even faster.” Lauda states that this title should feel more special as it was fought as a battle between teams and not team mates. “He was not in the best car this year. For the past three years, car advantage could even make me a world champion. But with the strong Ferrari this year, it has to be said that Lewis gave us the title and not the other way round,” On the way to the fourth title Hamilton has cracked some records it is true. But can he also reach the so far unattained record of Michael Schumacher and his seven world titles? “The desire to always improve, makes the difference in the big ones. It’s not hard to win a the Championship if you’re in the right car, many have already done that,” says Lauda. “But still, only a few manage to do so and Lewis is one of them. If he goes on like that, more titles will follow automatically. Whether he can beat Schumi depends on how many seasons he still has"
