Things ... 2015 - 2016 Silly Season. The Drivers Market.

[Incubus]

Yep. And historically that's the way it's always been viewed. The good win the title in the second year they spend in the junior category they enter. The great blitz everyone else else to the title in their first year. Those who spend more than two years in a junior category aren't viewed favourably whatever they do thereon.

 

[Il_leone]

No sticking around 1 category does not help drivers careers just ask Valsecchi, and Leimer. I maintain that Stevens did well considering the guys who finished in front of him that year were all in top teams and with backing from F1 teams

You cannot always say because someone has a great junior career they will cut it when it came to F1

It is difficult to gage Steven's potential because the car he 's driven and whether or not he is actually ready for F1.

 

[RasputinLives]

Vandoorne is in his second year. Are we dismissimg him?

 

[Spinodontosaurus]

The situation with Vandoorne is completely different. He was instantly competitive in GP2, winning his first race and finishing second overall in his rookie season to Palmer, who was in his 4th season. This is in addition to the rest of his career, including a similarly superb debut season in Formula Renault 3.5 (again winning his first race and finishing second overall).

@Il_leone
Valsecchi and Leimer are actually perfect examples of this. They are both GP2 champions, but they took so long to win the title (5 and 4 seasons respectively) that nobody in F1 cares, because if a driver takes that long to be competitive in a series then their F1 prospects do not look good. Leimer even had ~$13 million in sponsorship on his side and he still couldn't find a seat in F1.

I suppose this might be a useful read:
Who are the top 2015 juniors?

It is an attempt to rank junior careers using points. It's probably better if you read it rather than me try and badly summarise it, but I will list some relevant drivers and their scores below:

Stevens, 14
Wolff, 20
Chilton, 35
Merhi, 37
Maldonado, 46
...
Hamilton, 137
Vandoorne, 160
Hulkenberg, 201

And yes, junior careers do not always translate into success in F1, but it's the only guide we have and drivers who perform significantly better/worse than their junior career suggests are an exception, not the rule. We don't have any established benchmarks to rate Stevens and Merhi against, so all we can look to is their junior career, which suggests neither driver is particularly talented by F1 standards. This is further supported by Alex Rossi's ability to jump in mid-season and beat Stevens in both races so far.

 

[Westy]

Good evidence Spinodontosaurus That's a good look at how they all stack up. I'm glad Rossi is getting a shot after having his bubble burst a couple of times in the past. I doubt he'll ever make it big or be here for the long haul, but it is a feel good story that NBCSN are going to refuse to not shove it down our throats every race weekend. The USGP is going to be unbearable.

 

[Il_leone]

RasputinLives Nope but this season K Mag preparations and race sharpness has been very much disrupted where he has had no chance to show his ability and remind everyone of it

Spinodontosaurus You do get the odd driver who did not have stellar junior careers and end up as world champion like Hill and Mansell

I noticed the one notable exception on the junior ranking list - Max Verstappen who is just above Maldonado

and up near the top Robin Frijns - who had a disastrous GP2 season and has not had momentum since then

 

[Spinodontosaurus]

I don't know enough about Mansell's junior career to comment, but Damon Hill didn't even start racing until he was 21 - on motorbikes - and didn't debut in F1 itself until he was 31. That might partly explain why his junior career was poor.

Verstappen has a low ranking because he simply hasn't had enough time to accumulate enough points, competing in just 2 championships over the space of 1 year before jumping into F1. That is what the 'excitement' rating is for, to show drivers who have accumulated many points in a short space of time, which marks them as talents to watch for the future. Raikkonen, Button and Alonso also have high 'excitement' scores for the same reasons.

Robin Frijns did have a fairly poor season in GP2 - albeit participating in only half the races for one of the worst teams - but the rest of his career has been incredibly good. He skipped the usual intermediate stage of F3 or GP3 and instead jumped straight from Formula Renault 2.0 to FR 3.5 and won the series on debut, in the same season that Magnussen finished 7th on debut.

He's now in the Blancpain Sprint Series and is leading it along with team mate Laurens Vanthoor, although Vanthoor suffered a very big shunt at the most recent race, meaning the pair scored no points.

 

[Il_leone]

I would add that Hill did not any titles in junior career if I am right and spent 3 seasons doing F3 and then another 3 doing F3000 but he did show he was able to race at the front and lead races etc which impressed Williams enough to be their test driver

 

[Il_leone]

F1 news: Race seat or nothing in 2016 for Lotus F1 reserve Jolyon Palmer

Are both Mclaren young drivers on long term contracts with Woking?

 

[RasputinLives]

I think the 'instant success' rule is a commonly thought one and goes along with media hype but probably an error in some case.

Palmer and Nasr are perfect examples of this - actually so is Grosjean - sometimes drivers have raw speed but need time to learn and develop. The best way to do that is to have a few years in the junior catogries.

Vandoorne could have come into F1 with Toro Rosso for 2013 but turn the contract down to develop more. I think he's a better driver for it. I think its a mistake just to dismiss a driver because they weren't succesful straight away.

 

[Il_leone]

I sometimes wonder if K Mag did a season of GP2 whether it would have helped him develop better but such that i) Mclaren were not impressed with Perez's performances against K Mag ii) Ron apparently was championing for K Mag to be in F1

you wonder whether it was a logical decision anyway?

Trouble is because of the success of Hamilton and Vettel which ever rookie or young gun comes into F1 they have to be on it straight away

 

[Greenlantern101]

Looks like Kmag has something brewing.

 

[Spinodontosaurus]

EDIT: Magnussen spent 6 years in the junior ranks before being promoted into F1. That's a pretty standard length; Hamilton also spent 6 years in them, as has Vandoorne. He was probably put into F1 because he looked ready, and McLaren needed/wanted to replace Perez.

Palmer and Nasr are perfect examples of this

Palmer is a perfect example of the opposite. Talented drivers adapt and are quickly able to show their talent. Palmer did not, he was a slow starter in every series he entered and his GP2 career was terrible.

In 2011 he entered the 4-race GP2 Asia series, finishing 19th overall scoring zero points. Later in the year he entered the main GP2 series and he finished 28th out of 32 overall. 28th place, again scoring zero points and was the lowest placed driver to participate in every event.
In his second GP2 season - or third if you count the GP2 Asia series as a 'season' - he was better, but still only finished 11th, and was 7th in year 3 (or year 4).

His Formula 2 career was a little bit better, in his second season he finished 2nd overall, but finishing 21st overall in his first season was still dreadful. In Formula Palmer Audi he was 11th on debut and 3rd the next year.



Nasr had a strong junior career, even if his GP2 stint was only decent (10th, 4th, 3rd) the rest of his career was pretty good.

 

[RasputinLives]

Palmer is a perfect example of the opposite.

I think you may have misunderstood my point. The point I was making is that some drivers will start off slow in a series and start to develop. Thanks to the handy stats you've put up for me you can see this is the case with Palmer. He did indeed start near the bottom and work his way up. By the time he got to his championship year in GP2 he was an infinitly better driver and was able to be superior to much of the opposition around him.

Just because it took him longer to develop the talent does not mean he is any less talented. A six foot hole is still a six foot hole no matter how quick you dig it.

Unfourtuantly we are in the world of instand gratification and therefore people have this absurdly daft notion that if someone is not good at something straight away it means they never will be. I've afraid driving is not something that comes naturally in DNA but something you learn. People learn at different rates.

 

[Greenlantern101]

Maldonado for example. He should be half decent by 2044.

 

[Spinodontosaurus]

Unfourtuantly we are in the world of instand gratification and therefore people have this absurdly daft notion that if someone is not good at something straight away it means they never will be.

The ones who are better right off the bat will more than likely still be better 5 years down the line.

Maldonado had a fairly similar junior career to Palmer, started off in various series poorly then got progressively better results as the experience he gained driving the cars began to out weigh his lack of talent. His poor form in the junior categories has translated into F1 too. The holds true for almost every driver; those who have poor junior careers are poor in F1. The exceptions this are just that - exceptions.

Historical precedent strongly suggests that drivers like Palmer don't start off slowly because they are slow learners, they start off slowly because they are not good drivers (by F1 standards at least).

 

[Il_leone]

Hamilton started F1 at 22 years old and became world champion at 23 years old
Vettel started F1 at 19 years old and was world champion at 22 years old
Verstappen started F1 at 17 years old and world champion by ??

Nelson Piquet Jnr started F1 at 23 years old and finished by 25 years old
Jaime Algarsuari started F1 at 19 years old and retired by 25 years old
Heikki Kovalainen started at 25 years old and finished by 31 years old

The growing trend in F1 is that the drivers that come up have to be an instant hit as it seems like unless you've got money your career in F1 is going to be shortlived

There is also no real opportunities to late developers to be able to show their ability because the financial pressures of F1 nowadays make it even more difficult.

By today's expectations I think people like Nigel Mansell would have been out of F1 before he got himself into a competitive car

 

[Dartman]

With todays expectations I doubt Mansell or Damon Hill would have got into an F1 car let alone on track and Damon's dad would never have risen above a mechanic

 

[RasputinLives]

Spinodontosaurus - Shakespeare learnt to read and write at 10 years old meaning that I learnt around 6 or 7 years earlier than him. Strangely though my plays aren't studied by English Lit students the world over.

 

[Spinodontosaurus]

We aren't talking about literature, we are talking about motorsports, specifically F1, where throughout history rapid success in junior categories is strongly correlated with high levels of performance in F1.

By today's expectations I think people like Nigel Mansell would have been out of F1 before he got himself into a competitive car

I'm not sure about that. I mean sure, he was convincingly outperformed by both Elio de Angelis and Prost at both ends of his career, which suggests Mansell was not on the level of his eras top drivers (Senna, Prost and arguably de Angelis), but he was hardly rubbish.
In a world where Perez can get a seat at McLaren and Maldonado a seat at Lotus when both teams were competitive at the time of signing, I think a driver of Mansell's abilities would at least have a chance at a decent drive if all went well.