The other thread on Red Bulls slide from glory got me wondering what Team or Driver had the biggest fall from glory. Is there a team or driver that won everything then went nowhere the next season? What is the worst case of this?
Biggest fall from glory
- Thread starter marksawatsky
- Start date
The two drivers I can mainly suggest would be Emerson Fittipaldi and Jacques Villeneuve, both of whom totally screwed up their careers by changing teams--Emmo to his brother's Copersucar and JV to BAR which was truly terrible.
Lance Armstrong...
I thought about Jacques Villeneuve as well. Has any team fallen off the map?
Dash Racing
Points Scorer
I want to not like that post so badly. I was a Villeneuve fan.
Tyrrell, Lotus (The real team.), Benetton and many others I should think...
soccerman17
Race Winner
What ever happened to those Brawn GP lads? One season, 2 world titles, and then they just disappear!
Normally the decline of a team takes considerably longer than that of a driver. Two of the most precipitous declines from a team that I can recall belong to Cooper and BRM.
It is, at least nowadays, difficult to actually determine the "end date" of a team, since they more commonly are sold off rather than simply cease to exist.
It is, at least nowadays, difficult to actually determine the "end date" of a team, since they more commonly are sold off rather than simply cease to exist.
Dartman
Pole Sitter
Never actually thought JV was any good, did well in a Damon Hill sorted car, that went to his head and his mate made up a team for him. Everyone thought it was the car that let him down, then along came Button who walked all over him. OK it wasn't a brilliant car, just not as bad as JV drove it.
Damon wasn't even in the team the year JV won his title, so I don't see how that could have been "Damon Hill sorted", and I am a big fan of Damon.
I suspect Villeneuve had a better car than to be fighting with Schumacher, but I can't prove it.
I think you can't look beyond that as being the greatest fall from grace. I think one of the main criteria should be the reason. In most cases it's due to a change of regs, a change of driver or engine, or using a car far beyond it's useful life. In the case of Ferrari in 1980 none of those really hold true. The car was simply crap.
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That rather mirrored the Lotus decline from the glory in 1978 with the model 79, to the debacle of the model 80. The ironic thing in that is that Andretti says that the 80 was really a good car, but it produced so much downforce that the chassis wasn't stiff enough to handle it, and Chapman, ever averse to adding weight, refused to do anything to stiffen it.
It's why Williams gained a jump on them. Patrick Head looked at the 79 and quickly realised it needed stiffening. They reckon the 80 was so weak it would pop its rivets on a lap.
In fact, according to Mario, after he convinced Chapman to put the stiffening "collar" around the cockpit as they had done on the 79, the 80 did, indeed, start popping the rivets on the spring perches.
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I would have thought Mercedes walking away from F1 after sweeping all before them with Fangio and Moss.
The F1 website from 2014 to 2015. I simply cannot find anything earlier than 2014, is 1984 at work again?
The F1 website from 2014 to 2015. I simply cannot find anything earlier than 2014, is 1984 at work again?
Dash Racing
Points Scorer
Sadly true, LifeW12. That car was atrocious.
rufus_mcdufus
Champion Elect
Though that was down to the deaths of 84 people at Le Mans as opposed to their car becoming crap. I suppose it could be construed as a fall from grace in some respects.
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