Drivers

Nelson Piquet - The Forgotten Racist Champion Whenever lists of the "greatest" drivers are put together one man who never seems to figure is 3 times World Champion Nelson Piquet. I thought it worth giving a little biog of the man and then maybe discussing why someone as successful as Piquet rarely gets the credit he probably deserves as a multiple World Champion. Early Years Piquet was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 1952 Nelson Souto Maior. Piquet was his Mother's maiden name and he used this at the start of his racing career to hide his racing life from his family. Like many F1 drivers Piquet started in karts and then progressed onto Formula Super Vee in Brazil. Moving to Europe, in 1978 he was BP Super Visco British Formula 3...

Any of you who have been watching the BRDC F4 series on ITV 4 can't help but get a kick out of hearing the name Fittipaldi being said in excitment again. The Fittapaldi in question is the very young Pietro Fittapaldi, Grandson of Emerson, Nephew of Christian and maybe the next in a driver dynesty. For those of you not watching the F4 its a single seater series designed for kids straight out of Karts wanting to get into proffesional single seater racing. The majority of the drivers are so young they probably have to do their homework between sessions but the cars are even and the racing around British tracks is pretty exciting. The main thing is that ITV4 do an hour long highlights package of each 3 race weekend which means the young...

Probably one of the coolest drivers ever to grace F1 alongside James Hunt. His part life-style may not have been to some teams liking in F1 but you can't deny that Kimi was probably one of the best drivers on the grid from 2003-09. He should have won more championships than he did! Kimi won his one and only F1 Championship in 2007. Kimi won 18 races, 16 pole positions, scored 62 podiums and claimed 35 fastest laps in his time in F1. Kimi is probably the must unluckiest driver to ever grace F1 and the amount of retirements he had no fault of his own were lots. Kimi won his first GP in 2003 winning the Malaysian GP and he claimed his last victory in F1 at the 2009 Belguim GP. Kimi started his F1 career in 2001 driving for Sauber, he...

You know the little fat feller on Sky? He used to be an F1 driver you know. In fact, he was a pretty bloody good driver who overcame career threatening injuries to win 3 Grands Prix. In 1987 John Paul Herbert won the British Formula Three championship driving for Eddie Jordan. The next step was F3000, again with Jordan racing. Johnny won the season opener at Jerez and was third at Monaco. A couple of races later the circus moved to Brands Hatch. Johnny was on a high, he had signed a contract to drive for Benetton in Formula One who were managed by his long time mentor, Peter Collins. Johnny was on pole but lost a couple of places at the start. As the cars came back from the trip into the country side (they were using the full...

Arguably the best ever driver in mixed conditions, all his wins at Mclaren have come in those conditions. His last race win in the dry came at the 2009 Turkish GP. Button is known for his smooth driving style and is normally seen in must races doing one less stop than his rivals for tyres. Buttons also know to be a bit of a practical joker and will take part in anything fun. Since his debut in 2000 Button has won the majority of hearts in this country. But what is your favourite JB win? Mine has to be Hungaroring 2006, in argubly a midfield team and he won the race in those mixed conditions to take his first win. I can remember James Allen been in tears almost and that was the first race Anthony Davidson ever commentated on.

Today (19 August 2011) "Senna" opens in Toronto and i'm taking off early from work to catch a matinee' viewing. This is about as good a time as any to open this thread... From Prost's thread: There was no greater expert on the sights and sounds of a Formula One car at Aida that day than Senna himself...And if his expert ears and eyes noted that only Schumacher's B194 sounded and reacted like it had traction control then i'm going to believe it. Period. As per the accident at Tamburello...well, the saftey car that day wasn't exactly a Mercedes-Benz AMG...I believe it was an Opel and, as a result, a bit 'too' slow. The tyre pressures dropped significantly and that would have affected the ride height. Tamburello had a few bumps and...

The Vettel thread surprised me as such that when I searched for a Schumacher thread, I could not find one. So I propose this thread for Schumacher because regardless of your opinion whether his return is succesful or not, I think we can all agree that there's always something to talk about whether he's had a good or bad race. Historical Discussion may be allowed on the thread as long as it's on topic. Enjoy! :)

Nico Erik Rosberg, son of Keijo "Keke" Erik Rosberg, is about to have his 100th Grand Prix meeting this weekend in Hungary. I was about to write my "best wishes" to him in 'his' thread...but I couldn't find one...so, I figured I might as well start it off. What is very interesting is that his father, Keke, took part in 114 Grand Prix races in his entire Formula One career, winning 5 of them - all for Williams from 1982 to 1985 - as well as a World Championship. It's interesting in that Nico is approaching that number quickly and he's already about to finish off his 6th season in a few months...but without a win to his name...and no win in sight given the current pecking order of the cars. Some say Nico is a great talent...while...

Brilliant driver on his day but is he championship material? In 2008 he proved he was but thats only one occassion, plus that season the Ferrari TBH was a bit quicker and won more races that season. In 2009 he nearly suffered a career ending head-injury and since coming to back to the grid he hasn't really shown that promise he did in 2008. Don't get me wrong he's a driver i very much like, but i do wonder if he'll be a title challenger again for Ferrari season in season out or if he'll stay at Ferrari much longer? Whats your thoughts on Massa?

Who is George Russell asked Titch - well he's is 21 year old from Norfolk who the latest Brit on the F1 grid. For once I can actually say I've watched this kid all the way up the ladder. I first saw Russell in BRDC F4 (thank you ITV4) and he stood out then because in a field full of kids putting everything on the line for a win he was the only one who had the brain to think about the championship race and realise getting a decent haul of points was sometimes more important than chucking it in do or die style for the win. Low and behold he won the title. I next see him in European F3 in a field containing Felix Rosenqvist, Antonio Giovanazzi and Charles LeClerc. He was mostly midfield that year but spent a lot of time wheel banging with...

He only signed for Williams a few days ago but there has already been a large amount of discussion about Lance Stroll. It was suggested he needed his own thread so here it is. Lance Stroll first came on to my own radar when watching the Toyota Racing Series in New Zealand during Jan 2015. Often used as a warm-up for young talent pre-season to get them used to proper car racing its always close racing. Lance was the tender age of 16 and part of the Ferrari young driver program. He was also massively impressive with 10 podiums (4 wins) from 16 races in a car he'd hardly driven and tracks he'd never raced on. He was the eventual champion and I mentally stored him as someone to watch out for. From the Toyota series he went straight into...

I was just watching the Qualifying buildup for Singapore 2009 and found this piece with Damon Hill pretty interesting. This was soon after the Renault crash-gate revelations where some were questioning the legitimacy of the sport.