Who do you currently regard as the 3 greatest Formula 1 drivers and why?

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Originally Posted by Rollo

3. Alain Prost - Four Times World Champion though should have been Seven. Lost in 1984 when the Monaco GP was only credited with half points and had it run to 75% completion Prost would have been World Champion.
In 1988 he outscored Senna but under the stupidity that was "points dropping" threw away points rather than DNFs
In 1990 Senna deliberately drove into him thus endangering his life and stealing the World Championship by criminal and unfair means.

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I can't quite let that one on go! Seems Rollo isn't a Senna fan ;)

Monaco 1984 - Prost was leading but ordered the race to be stopped. In my opinion if he thought unsafe he should have pulled off the track and allowed everybody else to carry on. Senna, Bellof and even Rene Arnoux were catching him. So had it gone to at least 75% distance, he would have finished 3rd or 4th anyway. By losing the title at the final round, he really reaped what he sew at Monaco.

1988 - the rules were the same from the start and it would have a big effect on the mindframe before races. Had the points system been like it normally was both drivers would have gone into each race differently. To blame losing the title on a points system doesn't fit.

1990 - Well ok, you can have this one - but only if you give Senna the 1989 title for Prost drove into him in deliberate fashion as well. And then, Senna got restarted but the Frenchman at the head of the FIA chucked him out of the race on a technicality.

Who do I think is the best driver ever?

Senna. ;)

2nd: Fangio

3rd: Lauda

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Originally Posted by Bezza

Monaco 1984 - Prost was leading but ordered the race to be stopped. In my opinion if he thought unsafe he should have pulled off the track and allowed everybody else to carry on. Senna, Bellof and even Rene Arnoux were catching him. So had it gone to at least 75% distance, he would have finished 3rd or 4th anyway. By losing the title at the final round, he really reaped what he sew at Monaco

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Pat Symonds, who worked on Senna's Toleman at Monaco, is in Autosport this week, stating that the idea that Senna would have won at Monaco is a myth as Senna had smashed the suspension and it would not have lasted the full race distance.

Therefore, Senna winning at Monaco in 1984 if it were not for Prost getting the race stopped is a myth.

1. Michael Schumacher

2. Juan Manuel Fangio

3. Alain Prost

This is so hard to say--For their era, it is easy to pick Fangio from the 1950's, Clark from the sixties, Stewart early 70's, and so forth. But with the advent of wings and then all the latest demands on physical ability to withstand the g-forces and smacking, it is very unlikely that Fangio would have been competitive at all in the 1980 through 2008 era when he was of the age he was when he won his championships.

Hard to say about Clark. What made him so great was his feel for the car at the high speed corners and his well known ability to just take what was given and go fast (or inability to set up a car as some said back then), but with the advent of wings of the modern era, where the higher the speed, the more downforce and traction in faster corners means that very magic and delicate touch for high speed cornering would not be such a premium.

Although if Mario Andretti was any indication, then maybe that would not have been much of a problem for Clark, but Mario was perhaps the driver with the most ability to drive competitively in all sorts of cars who won a WDC, yet the year he won the WDC, he said that driving the F1 car was more like driving a go-kart rather than driving the cars when they had no wings, and the earlier cars required much more skill and touch, then to simply brake hard, point and then slam the gas on....then there was the semi-racing movie "Speedway" where he discussed all the problems of wings, g-forces and how tough it was to drive the modern cars because of the physical demands and need for quick reactions

1 Fangio
2 Stewart
3 Schumacher*



* denotes that Mike's name in the official f1 record books will never appear with an * after it.
In perpetuity!

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Originally Posted by Tazio

1 Fangio
2 Stewart
3 Schumacher*



* denotes that Mike's name in the official f1 record books will never appear with an * after it.
In perpetuity!

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:laugh:

Senna, Schumacher, Stewart - but I'm buggered if I'm putting them in order.

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Originally Posted by tamburello

Pat Symonds, who worked on Senna's Toleman at Monaco, is in Autosport this week, stating that the idea that Senna would have won at Monaco is a myth as Senna had smashed the suspension and it would not have lasted the full race distance.

Therefore, Senna winning at Monaco in 1984 if it were not for Prost getting the race stopped is a myth.

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This is not important as Senna was catching Prost and Prost got the race stopped because he didn't want to be beaten by (at the time) a rookie. In the end this cost him the championship - neither Prost nor Senna knew of this suspension damage.

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Originally Posted by tamburello

Pat Symonds, who worked on Senna's Toleman at Monaco, is in Autosport this week, stating that the idea that Senna would have won at Monaco is a myth as Senna had smashed the suspension and it would not have lasted the full race distance.

Therefore, Senna winning at Monaco in 1984 if it were not for Prost getting the race stopped is a myth.

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I read very recently, although I don't remember where, that Bellof was actually catching Senna faster than Senna was catching Prost. As someone said earlier, if if if...

If only Bellof hadn't taken that stupid chance at Eau Rouge, we might all be discussing him in this conversation.

Tony

Hey!! you guys forget Lewis Hamilton.